Letter to the Editor
Optus Outage
The senate inquiry into the Optus outage did not seem to show much brilliance in understanding the problem, no one knows what electrons will sometimes do in electronics, the science is to get them to do as we direct, but that does not always work as there are still unknown factors present is electron and sub-particle activity along with electron particles generating fields with positive charged attractor force particles and repulsive negative charges that do not always do as directed by program controls and unknown variables we are still learning about.
Electrons will always have unknown reactive factors we cannot control but have to deal with, and there will always be unpredictable factors and problems beyond our best effort of control.
It would appear Senator Hansen-Young needs to read a few books on computer electron forces, movements and functions. They need to stop blaming people for their own ignorance on these matters, electrons will always misbehave beyond the best of control functions — That is the way they function, get used to the fact that every so often problems with atoms will arise, beyond blame.
The Optus CEO Kelly Bayer Rosmarin, understood the unexplainable factors involved but others did not, Telstra has had their share of close calls but being monolithic they have error by pass systems. It is pathetic that when errors evolve some dullards appear compelled to blame someone instead of the rouge electrons.
Sincerely
Gil May
Forestdale 4118
And the CEO has now resigned no doubt with a big pay check and another job elsewhere. Resigning is not accountability. It’s literally pissing off when the SHTF or their job is done. Disgraceful. With surname “Bayer” guessing this woman is linked to pharmaceuticals perhaps????? From article:
“Optus chief executive Kelly Bayer Rosmarin has resigned effective immediately, after presiding over two high-profile telco disasters within 13 months.
The former CBA executive led Optus through one of the nation’s worst outages and worst data breaches in recent history, and has stepped down in a bid to give the telco a chance at a reset.
“On Friday I had the opportunity to appear before the Senate to expand on the cause of the network outage and how Optus recovered and responded,” she said.
“I was also able to communicate Optus’ commitment to restore trust and continue to serve customers. Having now had time for some personal reflection, I have come to the decision that my resignation is in the best interest of Optus moving forward.
It’s been an honour and privilege to lead the team at Optus and to serve our customers. I am proud of the team’s many achievements, and grateful for the support of the Optus team, [Singtel Group CEO Yuen Kuan] Moon, and the Group. I wish everyone and the company every success in the future.”
The company’s chief financial officer Michael Venter has been appointed interim CEO while the search for a replacement begins.
“Optus appointed Kelly at the beginning of the pandemic, and we acknowledge her leadership, commitment and hard work throughout what has been a challenging period and thank her for her dedication and service to Optus,” Moon said.
“Kelly has always led with integrity and had all stakeholders’ best interests at heart. We understand her decision and wish her the very best in her future endeavours.”
Is all ok though Gladys Berejiklian still employed at Optus.
https://www.smh.com.au/business/companies/optus-ceo-kelly-bayer-rosmarin-resigns-20231117-p5ekw8.html
Sometimes you can’t TELL the public the truth.
YOU MUST SHOW THEM.
ONLY THEN WILL PEOPLE FIND THE WILL TO CHANGE.
Sarah Hanson-Young found someone to throw under the bus just as her ally Elbow ran away for more holidays, to avoid attempts to throw him under the bus. Look how grumpy Elbow was, it would look too obvious if someone in the ALP was throwing somebody under the bus. But The Greens Party is an entirely different party, of course !!! Of course we know there could not be any deals going on between ALP and The Greens Party when they meet each other all day every day in Bob Hawke’s New Parliament House.
One day they will get the Teals Party trained up and then there will be even less connection between stunts, why the Teals Party members are “independent” aren’t they !!! I can’t wait until they are off the L plates and it’s their turn.
Now we discover there is another as yet unknown infiltraitor from Klaus Swab’s Young Global Leaders program and this one is called Dr (economist) Andrew Charlton of Paramatta. The others, S H-Y, Claire O’Neill the chief minister for Home Affairs and Andrew Bragg from the blue party, do not need to have meetings with each other, Klaus Swab has their number and someone will call them anytime they are required for this or that.
These YGLs aim to be among the surviving 500 million and will throw everyone else under the bus with forced injections, which Dr Andrew Charlton IS WORKING ON RIGHT NOW. Refer Joint Senate Committee on Treaties.
Well one good thing came out of it – that cash should always be carried on your person in your wallet or purse – and a stash kept at home.
So if it was a test of some kind, it certainly backfired in that regard.
People got angry when told to go to the ATM by businesses and get some cash out… why? because they probably couldn’t remember their pin numbers! A good lesson.
I now know people who carry cash.
Hey sorry fellas but the story we broke about Optus cyber attack was confirmed by one of our US intelligence sources today. Not a three letter agency however. Much more reliable. Ed
Cheers
cataclysmic duck: It depends on the configuration of the backbone and how the propagation of new ‘software’ is determined. It appears that the MPLS Cisco shut down and I am only looking at what reports are out there at the moment. Multi Protocol Labelling System has been around for some years and I am not sure if they have upgraded in the last few years but it is safe to say that it is always essential to test fully in the ‘pre-production environment’ to identify these issues before they become ‘issues’. You always have to remember the elements of IP backbone systems and there are many Disaster Recovery Plans and ‘Failover’ options that can be used as I had many planning meetings over a very long career. It always comes down to political pressure, financial pressure and of course timing pressure as to how much risk can you carry and what are you willing to spend to mitigate any risks.
I predict that heads will indeed roll at Optus and rightly so as better to delay than ‘Go Live’ and fail.
@Scotoz so if the protection on the active production network took a dislike (saw it as a threat) to say new security software running, in say a new operations centre that is switched over from the parallel network to control the APN, would it shut down the APN to protect customers data?
For those people who would like to understand how these outages can be triggered by external forces such as solar flares and electromagnetic pulses, have a look at Sub Quantum Kinetics.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1875389212025205
Written by the late Dr Paul Laviolette, “Subquantum Kinetics: A Systems Approach to Physics and Cosmology” provides answers for how modern communications systems can provide fail-safe operations. Optus are upgrading their systems to use Rare Earth Element components, produced in China, to provide faster, higher bandwidth networks. At the same time, the opportunities for human error increase when financial, political and market pressures limit the time for testing. It can also happen when the inmates are running the asylum.
Intuitively, I go with Scotoz. In all organisations these days, this is how decisons are made. We are led by idiots and incompetents. The Optus collapse augers well for the future. Given a compent enemy or an idiot, I will opt for the idiot any day.
I speak with some authority of both expertise and first hand knowledge and experience of having worked for Optus some years ago. I am a telecommunications engineer and worked for British Telecom, Telstra, Optus, Macquarie Telecom and many other companies in ICT and for over 40 years. I can tell you the correct approach has always been to have a ‘parallel’ network called a development platform and usually a cut down version and/or virtual platform. Any changes made to an ‘in production platform’ is made and loaded onto the development platform and then ‘regression tests’ are undertaken to see what impact it would have on the active production network.
The factors in this case would appear to be unknown however this CEO Rosmarin is totally inadequate and clueless in what her role is as she is primarily from a financial background and with many companies they lose sight of their objectives and merely look at the bottom line. I vividly remember sitting in a Production Readiness Assessment Meeting as a senior PM at Optus and being asked if I thought a project was ready to go from ‘pre-production’ testing to full production. I was the only dissenter as my reputation would suffer as this ‘politically pressured’ decision was being forced through. I said we could go active in stages but this was rejected out of hand by other stakeholders. I warned that if they went ‘into production’ then within a very short time they would be forced to revert back to its then current state. Two weeks later it was taken out of production as I predicted. My point is that it requires an ‘RCA’ or Root Cause Analysis however if a political decision unlikely to be seen as the cause. In many ways it was timely as we are looking at CBDCs being pushed for a cashless society so every cloud has a silver lining.
Klaus Swab’s protege, Sarah Hanson-Young is suffering from years of relevance deprivation as she has never contributed anything memorable or worthwhile, apart from trying to claw her way to the top year after year. Her performance in the senate committee was embarrassing and pathetic. She seemed to have no focus, no background knowledge, no skill at oratory, no visible talent in anything. I hope the Greens Party promotes her to leader so green-voting people can finally wake up and look for a new party to vote for, something more like when Bob Brown started out. The Greens Party is a joke, the Teals Party is a fraud and the Red-Blue duopoly is a disgrace.
Its an important wake up call, our communications can go out as fast as a light switch. Elderly that rely on pendant alarms are now vulnerable, no banking, no buying food or fuel plus no cash on the horizon. Apparently a lot of oldies phones stopped working so I am sure they are all on a more expensive plan if their mobile shark providers gave assistance. A decent government would be looking for alternatives and installing back up systems. Our bunch of opportunist scabs stay silent or scatter to avoid any blame
advaustralia
Yeah, and if you believe this apologist rubbish by Gil May I have a bridge in Sydney I can sell you.
Agree – it is a somewhat Pollyannaish comment.
However, I have to disagree with you here:
“The “experts” at Optus told us they were “upgrading” their system, but whoever was in charge didn’t know diddley-squat about planning how to do it. They messed up.”
Highly unlikely. They don’t ‘mess up’ and anyone who still believes that is very naive. They know all they need to know about planning catastrophic events such as this one.
I’m onboard with Carman’s ‘theory’ (although it’s about 99% likely to be the actual truth as opposed to a mere theory:
Carman
One theory – the half-day phone outage was an experiment to gauge reactions.
Pretty sure you’ve hit the nail on the head there, Carman.
After all, the whole manufactured and demonstrably false ‘deadly pandemic’ psyop was the same experiment, only a lot bigger and a thousand times more destructive and dehumanizing.
It’s what they do.
advaustralia said – “They messed up.”
I’d be skeptical about that – more likely everything going to plan IMO. That’s how Klaus & Smeagol & creepy Bill like to roll.
In any case, whatever happened, odds on there was someone pulling the strings to make it happen.
Yeah, and if you believe this apologist rubbish by Gil May I have a bridge in Sydney I can sell you. Gil, instead of pontificating about something you obviously know nothing about, why don’t you go dig a deep hole instead? At least when you reach the bottom you’ll feel right at home in the dark. The FACT is, computers are dumb. They can only count to 2 and they don’t even do that as most people would expect. They actually count zero (off) and 1 (on). So when a computer doesn’t work properly, it’s always because of human error. The “experts” at Optus told us they were “upgrading” their system, but whoever was in charge didn’t know diddley-squat about planning how to do it. They messed up. They need to accept the blame and take responsibility.
i still believe it was a ransomware hack that they would not pay up on.
Of course they wont’t speak about that being the cause. Blame it on am electron. Easier as most people will not know that they a talking about and just leave the issue as a malfunction that probably will never happen again. Ha Ha
One theory – the half-day phone outage was an experiment to gauge reactions. Would miffed customers be happy with extra data as compensation, would they demand the financial system retain the option of cash in transactions? The outcome – a collective meh spread across the nation like a fog of dumb. The CEO was the fall-guy, that’ll fix things.
Well, with due respect to the author, there’s more to communications technologies than “electrons”.
And yes, we DO NOT understand what “electrons” are or the full spectrum of what they’re capable of doing, although empirical evidence for a couple hundred years does suggest their behaviour in a controlled context is very predictable.
But that’s heading along the lines of a “straw man”, deflecting attention to a peripheral subject that has little bearing on the issue at hand.
Here’s the thing – “Correlation is not Causation”, true enough.
But on the flip side, Causation Correlates. And timing matters.