More corporate woes have emerged today as Vodafone's network went down this morning after someone broke into one of their maximum-security data exchanges in Basingstoke.
Vodafone is one of the UK's biggest mobile networks and was broken for a large part of the M4 corridor this morning, everything from 2G, 3G, SMS, Blackberry and voicemail.
According to Vodafone someone broke into one of their facilities in Basingstoke last night and cause significant damage to the network as well stealing and damaging IT equipment.
Vodafone has poured water over early reports that it was affecting 4 million customers; apparently it's more like 1million of their 19million customers.
But this sort of incident has never happened to Vodafone before, they said: "All our sites are protected by high level security systems – we’re reviewing these with the police in the light of last night’s break in.
They added: "Loss of service is mainly confined to parts of the M4 corridor and some areas either side."
We can’t imagine quite such a service disruption being caused by a random act of vandalism or burglary, perhaps a disgruntled employee felt the need to vent his or her frustrations in grand style? Or has O2 gone gangster on the competition?
Has your service been affected today – let us know below ?
This has just come our way from Engadget: “Vodafone got in touch to say that 2G and 3G voice connectivity has been restored as of lunchtime in the UK and text and data services should be up within “the next couple of hours.” The company estimates the issue has affected “a couple of hundred thousand users”, though it expects that number to drop to zero before the day is through.
So their you have it 200,000 customers, from what we’ve seen on twitter, facebook and our own comments section – 200,000 doesn’t sound right to us. As ever keep hitting the comments with what service you have and where.
16 thoughts on “Burglar Brings Vodafone’s Mobile Network Down “Updated””
My Vodafone service has been down all day since this morning, and I am in Fulham in Central London, so clearly this is not confined to the M4 corridor!!
My phone has been down ALL DAY and I run a business from this number, it’s disrupted my clients and my income. This is ridiculous.
Thanks for the heads up – the info was from Vodafone – think they are playing the spin game – probably worse that their letting on. Hope your connected soon.
I am sooooo annoyed i am in basingstoke and cant do ANYTHING on my phone. GR!
I’m in Cornwall and still no service at 15:00 – Suggest they stop using amateur security and use some professionals.
I’m not impressed, I hope vodafone will be compensating us for this!
1 million less boring facebook updates.
1 million less pointless twitter tweets
Anybody who runs a business from a mobile with no backup is not much of a business man/woman. Ever heard of number redirection to another phone? Perhaps buy a cheap £10 emergency phone?
Things like this are going to happen occasionally, no amount of security will stop people intent on stealing expensive equipment. I doubt the world will stop turning today because of this.
Still no 3G in Reading RG1 at 5 pm. The information on the break in appeared only later in the afternoon. I don’t understand – was it too much for Vodafone to inform their customers of what happened through their website straight away? How many thousands of frustrated people tried to get through to them first thing in the morning wanting to know why their phones don’t work.
My network has been down since Saturday and I am on the East Coast of Yorkshire – no access to my address book at all and phone misbehaving in all sorts of ways!
am in cornwall too — no signal here all day — not exactly M4 corridor?!?!
I am in the Dunstable area, Bedfordshire so no where near the M4, although I can call out, anyone calling me gets an unobtainable tone. Same with someone else at work. Hope I do not get an emergency.
O2 network down in BA13 area. Even though O2 say they do not have a network problems. Both mine and my wides phone will not work but are ok 1.5 miles away. Live network coverage online shows all is ok.
Mine my husbands and our friends phones were all diabled today 28th February 2011, all day untill 2200hrs, as none of us had any network coverage on vodafone.
im from cornwall and everyone i know inc me thats on vodaphone havnt been able to use phone all day, so there verbal diorea about the m4 corridor is a load of rubbish!!
Hi All
Just to clarify this regarding the disruption of services, it has not impacted the entire network (or millions of customers) as has been suggested. In total, this impacted 3.2% of our customer base primarily in the M4/M3 corridor areas (Vodafone currently has approx 19 million customers in the UK), although for those affected the disruption lasted several hours and we can confirm that all services have now been restored.
Many Thanks
Simon
Web Relations Team
Vodafone UK
Oh thats ok then Simon, only 608,000 customers affected. Nothing like having some resilience in your network, some redundant systems, disaster recovery plans obviously well rehearsed. So one site is affected, and everything stops working for a whole area for several hours. Nice well designed systems there for a multi-million pound company.