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Telstra Fined $12 Million for Secretly Slowing Internet Speeds of Nearly 9,000 Customers

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Australia’s largest telecommunications company, Telstra, has been ordered to pay A$18 million (about $11.9 million) after a court found it misled thousands of customers by reducing their internet speeds without informing them, the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) announced on Friday.

According to the ACCC, Telstra migrated 8,897 customers from its low-cost brand Belong to a plan with half the original upload speed between October and November 2020, without any notification or consent. This left users unknowingly paying for a downgraded service.

“Telstra’s failure to inform customers that their broadband service had been changed denied them the opportunity to decide whether the changed service was suitable for their needs,” said ACCC Commissioner Anna Brakey. The regulator emphasized that customers deserve transparency and control over the quality of the services they pay for.

Beyond the fine, Telstra has committed to compensating affected customers, offering A$15 credits or refunds for every month they were on the reduced-speed plan. A Telstra spokesperson told Reuters that the company accepted the court’s decision and was finalizing remediation efforts.

The ruling adds to growing regulatory scrutiny of Australia’s telecom sector, particularly after Optus—one of Telstra’s main competitors—suffered two emergency call outages last month, one of which was linked to four deaths.

On the market, Telstra shares fell 0.7% following the announcement, while the broader Australian benchmark index (.AXJO) rose 0.5%.

The case underscores how digital infrastructure providers are increasingly being held accountable for consumer transparency and service integrity, as Australia tightens oversight over its critical communications networks.

Singtel Apologizes After Deadly Optus Outage in Australia

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Singapore Telecommunications (Singtel), the parent company of Australia’s second-largest telecom operator Optus, issued an apology on Wednesday after a major network outage disrupted emergency calls and has been linked to four deaths.

Singtel Group CEO Yuen Kuan Moon said the company is working with the Optus board to investigate last week’s 13-hour outage and to ensure such failures do not happen again. “We are deeply sorry to learn about the network incident at our Optus subsidiary that has impacted triple-0 calls, and to hear that customers could not connect to emergency services when they most needed them,” he said in a statement.

Optus revealed that the disruption stemmed from a network firewall upgrade gone wrong, leaving about 600 customers—some in remote areas—unable to make phone calls, including emergency calls.

Public anger over the outage has intensified, with Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese calling the incident “completely unacceptable.”

Optus CEO Stephen Rue admitted that procedures were not followed during the incident and said preliminary checks suggested human error may have been a factor.

Kerry Schott, a non-executive director at AGL Energy, will lead an independent review into the failure. Rue said the review will focus on the technical causes, internal processes, and how triple-0 calls were managed during the outage.

The review is expected to be completed by the end of the year, with results first reported to the Optus board and then made public.

Optus admits process failure caused fatal emergency call outage

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Optus, Australia’s second-largest telecom operator, said on Sunday that a failure to follow established procedures during a firewall upgrade triggered the 13-hour outage of emergency call services last week, an incident now linked to the deaths of four people.

The outage, which ran from 12:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Thursday, potentially affected 600 customers across South Australia, Western Australia, and the Northern Territory. Optus CEO Stephen Rue acknowledged the company’s initial investigation found staff departed from standard processes during the upgrade.

Five customers contacted Optus’ call centre during the outage, but their concerns were never escalated. “That is clearly not good enough,” Rue said, adding: “I want to reiterate how sorry I am about the very sad loss of the lives of four people, who could not reach emergency services in their time of need.”

The fatalities include an eight-week-old boy, a 68-year-old woman, and two men aged 74 and 49, police confirmed.

The Australian government has already launched an investigation, calling the failure “unacceptable.” Optus, owned by Singapore Telecommunications (Singtel), said it would cooperate fully and publish the results of its internal review.

The outage is the latest in a series of crises for Optus. In 2022, it suffered a cyberattack that exposed data from 9.5 million Australians. In 2023, it was fined A$12 million ($7.9 million) for failing to provide emergency call services during another nationwide outage. The repeated failures led to the resignation of then-CEO Kelly Bayer Rosmarin, with Rue taking over in late 2024.

The incident has intensified pressure on Optus and regulators to strengthen oversight of critical telecom infrastructure, as public confidence in the carrier continues to erode.