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Cellular outage in U.S. hits AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon users

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Re: Cellular outage in U.S. hits AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon users

#401

Post by derbOac »

mstudio wrote: post #108

My ATT Phone is in SOS mode. However, ATT's outages status reports: > All clear! No outages to report. > We didn’t find any outages in your area. Still having issues? https://www.att.com/outages/

Our land-based internet with a different [large] ISP went out about 18 hours before this stuff with wireless started, and is still going on. We've been getting similar contradictory messaging the whole time, and they seem confused about what's causing it. We got a message a couple of hours ago it had been resolved and then 30 minutes later said it was not.

It could be entirely coincidental and unrelated to the stuff with other networks, but the timing was odd and I have never ever seen anything like this outage from them. I can think of one time it was out for around 2 hours in the last 5 years, and it was with a very specific infrastructural upgrade they knew about.

Re: Cellular outage in U.S. hits AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon users

#402

Post by steelframe »

jader201 wrote: post #276

Something I'm not seeing discussion on: What is/were the cascading effects of this, particularly for drivers? Many people in buildings were unaffected, as they could fallback to wifi. But I imagine this had a pretty broad impact to drivers. Just a few things I can think of: - Packages delayed (UPS, FedEx, Amazon, truck drivers, etc.) for drivers that relied on their phone's mapping apps to get them to their deliverie…

> Traffic worsened because drivers weren't able to optimize their routes

This might explain a huge random traffic jam I hit in the middle of my town this morning.

I had no idea any kind of an outage was happening because I've intentionally scaled back my dependence on my phone. I always used to automatically pull up Google Maps to navigate no matter how short the trip. At some point I realized I was losing my ability to travel without being completely dependent on some company tracking my location and telling me what to do, so as part of my phone de-Googlification I switched to Organic Maps. And even then I try to navigate on my own without any GPS assistance as often as possible. I feel like navigating is a skill you can actually lose if you don't practice doing it.

After running an errand across town this morning, I decided to try getting back home via the biggest arterial through the city that I know about, and I immediately hit a huge westbound backup stretching at least a mile. It was a total standstill. I peeked ahead trying to see if there was some kind of accident or something and didn't see anything. Everyone was just sitting in this traffic jam, and I couldn't for the life of me figure out why.

I immediately flipped a u-turn and went 3/4 of a mile north to another westbound road I knew about. That one was completely clear of any traffic at all, and I was able to drive the speed limit all the way back.

The most-used navigation apps I know of suggest alternate routes when there's congestion, so why were all those people just sitting there in that jam while a parallel road less than a mile away was clear? Maybe it was this cascading effect of too many people conditioned into being told what to do by their phones while their phones couldn't tell them to take the other route.

Re: Cellular outage in U.S. hits AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon users

#403

Post by SpaethCo »

throwway120385 wrote: post #362
SpaethCo wrote: post #352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

TOTP or SMS, it's just another text password you're entering in that's fully phishable. TOTP just "feels" more secure.

TOTP is more secure in that you can't be simjacked by someone impersonating you in the cell phone store.

That's assuming your attacker already has your password, or the service allows SMS password reset. (thus negating the second factor. Essentially SMS becomes the only factor.)

Re: Cellular outage in U.S. hits AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon users

#404

Post by steelframe »

Scoundreller wrote: post #325
dktalks wrote: post #322

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you use Google Maps, it will automatically prompt you to download a map of the area if there is known poor coverage. It also has automatic (?) local maps.

One beef of mine with Google’s offline maps is that they’re only driving maps, and not walking/transit/cycling maps. Obviously you can kinda figure out walking paths anyway, but since I’m sometimes travelling without roaming access, it’s unfortunate.

Have you tried Organic Maps for walking or cycling routes?

Re: Cellular outage in U.S. hits AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon users

#405

Post by steelframe »

Scoundreller wrote: post #291
standardUser wrote: post #286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Worth noting that GPS does not rely on cell service.

The routing does though. I have Google offline maps downloaded for areas I end up in just in this case. Gotta do traffic rerouting the old fashioned way though. Or have an old-school GPS map thingy in your glovebox. (Also have kiwix and a whole archive of Wikipedia on my phone). I wonder if meshtastic communicators sales took off during this. How’s LoRa traffic these days?

> Or have an old-school GPS map thingy in your glovebox

You can also install Organic Maps on your phone.

Re: Cellular outage in U.S. hits AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon users

#406

Post by SpaethCo »

jjav wrote: post #370
SpaethCo wrote: post #352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

TOTP or SMS, it's just another text password you're entering in that's fully phishable. TOTP just "feels" more secure.

No, TOTP is far more secure because it has no dependence on a third-party who can mess up in many ways (Denial of service like in this case by being unavailable, Impersonation by allowing SIM swaps or intercepting messages directly). You fully control how to store the TOTP seed and how you compute the value, so it is far more secure. Yes, it can be phished if you fall for that, but it removes several attack vectors.

> Yes, it can be phished if you fall for that, but it removes several attack vectors.

How was the first factor (the password) compromised?

Assuming the user is using site-unique passwords, in 99% of cases where an attacker obtains a functional password they can get at least one TOTP code or the seed in the same manner. (ie, if I can steal your password DB, odds are pretty good for me stealing your TOTP seed DB as well.)

The outcome of a single successful authentication is a longer-lived session cookie. Once an attacker has that they can reset your creds (usually just requiring re-entering the password) and the account is theirs.

IMO, the only 2nd factor that matters are those that mutually authenticate like PassKeys / FIDO keys.

Re: Cellular outage in U.S. hits AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon users

#407

Post by steelframe »

danesparza wrote: post #304
panarky wrote: post #297

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also can't login to sites that require SMS 2FA.

Well ... let's be honest: SMS 2FA shouldn't be a thing. TOTP or stronger, please.

> TOTP or stronger, please

One of the biggest weaknesses with TOTP apps I've tried using is that you have to remember to transfer them to a new phone before you get rid of your old phone. I once got locked out of a domain registrar because I set up TOTP on an old phone many years back. That was long gone by the time I wanted to do something with my domain.

TOTP is fine, but always give me recovery codes I can print and out and keep with my other important documents. Too many services don't do that.

Re: Cellular outage in U.S. hits AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon users

#408

Post by thedaly »

Diederich wrote: post #385
Animats wrote: post #331

This is a serious architectural flaw. In the entire history of electromechanical switching in the Bell System, no central office was ever out of service for more than 30 minutes for any reason other than a natural disaster, or, on one single occasion, a major fire in NYC. The AT&T Long Lines system in the 1960s and 1970s had ten regional centers, all independent and heavily interconnected. There was a control center,…

In this context, what's the physical scale of a 'central office', as far as regional dimensions? Thanks!

I suspect that when AT&T built all the COs (1950-70s) they were constrained by both max number of lines and physical distance.

You’ll see numerous COs in a big city, but they are also pretty widely dispersed throughout the suburbs and rural areas.

Re: Cellular outage in U.S. hits AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon users

#409

Post by akira2501 »

flippy_flops wrote: post #224
kevin_nisbet wrote: post #200

To everyone trying to speculate on the root cause, I haven't seen enough information in any of the comments to really draw any conclusions. Having worked on several nationwide cellular issues in Canada when I worked in telecom, we saw nationwide impacts based on any number of causes. - A new route injected in the network caused the routing engines on a type of cellular specific equipment to crash nationwide. This too…

The speculation is fascinating. For most people, their guess is a reflection of themselves. Is there a term for that? This is a gross generalization, but I've seen... - Science people guessing solar flares - My "right-wing friend" guessed international hackers - I, myself, guessed it was a botched software release - Someone in this post commented their military friend says get gas And yet, like everyone else, I genui…

> I genuinely feel that I'm probably right

We are wired that way for a reason. Until you personally see conflicting evidence you have to make an assumption or you would spend your life paralyzed or ignorant.

Biology rewards action more than accuracy.

Re: Cellular outage in U.S. hits AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon users

#410

Post by akira2501 »

joshstrange wrote: post #104
bombcar wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's even sadder - I used to be able to play computer games for hours offline, now I get about five minutes into even the ones WITH on offline mode, and I'm grabbing for a wiki or other reference. Ah, some of it is just getting old.

I think some of it is just not having oodles of free time to figure it out on your own. When I was young I would just keep trying things till I figured out the game, my time wasn't worth much or at least I didn't value it highly. Nowadays I don't want to spend 1-3 hours figuring something frustrating that's blocking my progress. The "rush" I get from solving it on my own does not make up for the time lost. Also I fee…

So.. it's an adult strategy for playing video games to extract a candy coated "win." We are all either overgrown children and always will be, or something has gone drastically wrong in the schools.
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