{"id":102214,"date":"2026-01-16T13:18:23","date_gmt":"2026-01-16T13:18:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/102214\/"},"modified":"2026-01-16T13:18:23","modified_gmt":"2026-01-16T13:18:23","slug":"likely-culprit-in-massive-verizon-outage-revealed-report","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/102214\/","title":{"rendered":"Likely culprit in massive Verizon outage revealed: report"},"content":{"rendered":"

Federal and local officials investigating Verizon\u2019s massive outage<\/a> are increasingly pointing to a suspected server failure in New Jersey as the company definitively ruled out a cyberattack.<\/p>\n

The telecoms giant was apologetic late Wednesday after hourslong disruptions knocked phones offline nationwide and even interfered with some 911 calls.<\/p>\n

A company spokesperson told The Post on Thursday morning that a \u201csoftware issue\u201d was to blame.<\/p>\n

The outage, which began Wednesday afternoon<\/a> and dragged into the late hours, triggered a flood of complaints from coast to coast as Verizon customers reported phones stuck in SOS mode, dropped calls and dead mobile data.<\/p>\n

Verizon worked to restore service following a massive nationwide outage that left thousands of customers without cell service. Getty Images<\/p>\n

Multiple law enforcement agencies examined whether the breakdown could have been the result of a cyberattack, but that scenario was ultimately ruled out, with officials believing the failure stemmed from an internal network issue tied to servers in New Jersey, according to reports cited by ABC News.<\/a><\/p>\n

More than 178,000 Verizon customers were affected, according to Downdetector, with the heaviest concentration of reports coming from New York City, Atlanta, Charlotte and Houston.<\/p>\n

By midafternoon Wednesday, reports had fallen below 60,000 as service gradually returned.<\/p>\n

More than 178,000 Verizon customers reported service outages at the peak of a nationwide disruption, according to Downdetector. Downdetector<\/p>\n

Customers took to the internet to vent their anger as they described losing service for much of the day.<\/p>\n

Some Verizon subscribers saw brief restorations before their phones dropped back into SOS mode while others complained they couldn\u2019t work, place calls or reliably reach family members.<\/p>\n

The outage grew serious enough that New York City Emergency Management warned residents that some Verizon users were unable to reach 911 and advised calling from another carrier, using a landline or going directly to a police precinct or fire station.<\/p>\n

By late Wednesday, Verizon said the issue had been resolved after engineers worked through the night to restore service across the network.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis was a software issue, not a cyber event, and we are conducting a full review of what happened,\u201d a Verizon spokesperson told The Post.<\/p>\n

Verizon said service was restored after an outage that at its peak left over 175,000 customers reporting problems nationwide. Downdetector<\/p>\n

\u201cYesterday, we did not meet the standard of excellence our customers expect and that we expect of ourselves.\u201d<\/p>\n

Verizon said it will give customers a $20 account credit that can be redeemed through the myVerizon app.<\/p>\n

\u201cOn average, this covers multiple days of service. Our business customers will be contacted directly about their credits,\u201d the company rep told The Post.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis credit isn\u2019t meant to make up for what happened \u2014 no credit really can \u2014 but it\u2019s a way of acknowledging our customers\u2019 time and showing that this matters to us,\u201d the spokesperson added.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are sorry for what our customers experienced and will continue to work hard day and night to provide the outstanding network and service that people expect from Verizon.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Federal and local officials investigating Verizon\u2019s massive outage are increasingly pointing to a suspected server failure in New…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":102215,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[288,9,11,10,46028,18330,46781,46174],"class_list":["post-102214","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-business","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-headlines","tag-new-york-news","tag-outages","tag-verizon","tag-verizon-fios","tag-verizon-wireless"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102214","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=102214"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/102214\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/102215"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=102214"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=102214"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=102214"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}