Verizon customers on Friday were afflicted by an early morning outage that the company later traced to an act of severe vandalism in Southern California.
The outage, which primarily impacted Verizon’s wireless phone customers, was felt across the country, with the West Coast being among the most-affected.
Reports of outages began surfacing around 5:30 a.m. Pacific Time (PT), according to data from DownDetector, which tracks service interruptions based on user reports. Customers complained of issues with mobile service and 5G home internet, with many unable to make calls or connect to the network.
Verizon’s own service-status website acknowledged the problem, displaying a message that read, “There is a known issue, and we’re working on a solution,” when users checked their connections across multiple regions.
Around 1 p.m. PT, a Verizon spokesperson said the incident was the result of someone cutting their fiber optic lines in the Los Angeles area.
“Multiple fiber cuts due to acts of vandalism caused service interruptions for some customers in Greater Los Angeles County,” the spokesperson told reporters.
Police have not said who may have been responsible for the damage or whether any arrests have been made. A spokesperson for the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Office said the agency was not aware of any investigation connected to the incident.
“These dangerous acts not only impact families, students, and businesses, they are a direct threat to the safety and security of Angelenos,” Verizon said in a statement. “We know how much people rely on Verizon, and we are actively working with community leaders on ways to stop these actions.”
Friday’s disruption marked the second major issue in as many days for Verizon customers. Early Thursday morning, some users briefly lost service for several hours, though the issue was resolved before most subscribers began their day.
The incident is the latest act of vandalism to impact a telecommunications service provider in recent months.
Earlier this year, Charter Communications said someone deliberately cut several fiber optic cables in Van Nuys, a suburb of Los Angeles. The vandalism disrupted Charter’s Spectrum TV and Spectrum Internet service for more than 50,000 residential and business customers.
Nearly two weeks later, Charter said another service-related disruption in Missouri was due to another act of vandalism. In both cases, Charter characterized the incident as forms of “domestic terrorism,” though law enforcement investigators have yet to corroborate that claim.
“These attacks are more than mere acts of vandalism; they are disrupting access to critical emergency services and creating potentially life-threatening situations,” said Chris Crocker, the Special Agent-in-Charge of the FBI Field Office in St. Louis. “Combating this threat requires a coordinated effort, and we urge the public to report any suspicious activity to law enforcement. Together, we can help bring those responsible for endangering public safety to justice.”
Charter is one of several telecom providers that backs an initiative called “Protect Critical Communications Infrastructure,” (Protect CCI) which includes trade organizations CTIA, NCTA the Internet & Television Association and U.S. Telecom. Data from Protect CCI shows telecom-related vandalism cases grew to more than 6,000 last year; some of those cases involve Charter’s equipment and network.
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