Verizon experienced a major network outage on Wednesday that disrupted service for up to 2 million customers across the United States for more than eight hours. The carrier attributed the issue to a software problem and not a cybersecurity incident, while offering affected users a $20 credit. A telecommunications analyst points to a possible human error in a 5G update as the culprit.
Verizon's network suffered a significant blackout on Wednesday, impacting service nationwide and drawing over 1.5 million reports on Downdetector. The outage lasted more than eight hours, affecting customers from New York and Florida to Hawaii, Los Angeles, and Oakland, California. Unlike regional disruptions from natural disasters or hardware failures, this issue spanned the entire country.
The company resolved the problem late Wednesday evening and instructed users to restart their devices for reconnection. In a statement to TechRadar, Verizon described the cause as a "software issue" with no evidence of a cybersecurity breach. To compensate, Verizon announced a $20 credit for those affected, redeemable through the myVerizon app or via customer service channels including phone, chat, and online support.
On X, formerly Twitter, Verizon acknowledged the inconvenience: "This credit isn’t meant to make up for what happened. No credit really can. But it’s a way of acknowledging your time and showing that this matters to us." Many customers expressed frustration over the credit's modest amount and the need to claim it manually.
Telecommunications analyst Roger Entner of Recon Analytics provided insight into the potential cause. He suspects the outage stemmed from Verizon's 5G Standalone (SA) core network, which relies solely on 5G technology without 4G LTE fallback. "It looks like their 5G SA (Standalone) core went down during a minor feature change," Entner told CNET. The disruption appeared limited to high-end devices in markets with 5G SA deployment.
Entner highlighted the unusual timing, noting that major upgrades typically occur overnight. "When carriers do massive upgrades, they do that between 2 a.m. and 4 a.m. in the morning," he said. "A noon start for the crash indicates 'fat fingers' for a smaller change that cascaded through the system." Verizon has not confirmed these details, and the story remains developing.
