Japan suffers horrendous phone network outage for most of the weekend

By Trevor Mogg July 4, 2022

UPDATE: KDDI said on Tuesday that it had finally succeeded in fully restoring its service after 86 hours of disruption.

Tens of millions of cell phone users in Japan were unable to connect for most of the weekend in what’s believed to be the country’s worst-ever service outage in terms of the number of lines affected.

Mobile carrier company KDDI said the disruption began early on Saturday and continued through Sunday, though some users were still experiencing problems on Monday.

The unprecedented outage impacted nearly 40 million customers, equal to about a third of the country’s population, national broadcaster NHK reported.

Affected services included KDDI’s “au” brand, as well as customers of UQmobile and Povo services, which use KDDI’s infrastructure.

It’s not entirely clear what caused the outage, though KDDI said it began when engineers were installing new equipment.

Users, some of them corporate customers, were unable to make calls or use the internet, leaving those desperate to make a call having to borrow a friend’s phone or seek out one of the decreasing number of public pay phones.

Unable to make calls, do online banking, organize deliveries, book rides, and take advantage of the myriad of other services normally available to phone users, tens of millions of regular customers were left extremely frustrated.

Communications minister Kaneko Yasushi said the incident was a concern because it also made it hard for some services to respond to emergency calls.

Responding to the debacle on Sunday while delivering the customary apologetic bow, KDDI president Takahashi Makoto said that he recognized the outage as a ”serious incident” and promised his company would respond appropriately according to Japanese law.

Editors' Recommendations

Topics

Tech News

Contributing Editor

Not so many moons ago, Trevor moved from one tea-loving island nation that drives on the left (Britain) to another (Japan)…

Mobile

Photographic Styles is the most underrated iPhone 14 camera feature you’re not using

iPhone 14 Pro settings on photographic styles

For a lot of us, Apple’s iPhone is one of the best digital cameras that we own. Each year, Apple always improves the camera capabilities of the iPhone through both hardware and software. Even though this year we got the iPhone 14 Pro with a 48MP main camera, I want to put the spotlight on one of the more underrated software features that you may not be aware of.

Photographic Styles was a feature that was introduced with the iPhone 13 lineup, and it’s a great addition to an iPhone photographer’s arsenal of tools. It’s probably one of the more underrated camera features, and there’s plenty of reason to use it.
What are Photographic Styles?

Mobile

How old phones became the cool, good phones in 2022

iPhone 14 Pro and 13 Pro camera modules.

Smartphones have never been more expensive. As prices have crept steadily north of $1,000 (with some notable holdouts), the global economy has cratered. You want shiny new tech to replace an old but failing device, but you simply can't afford it.

The trick is, you don't have to. Though companies may stop making new stock, there's value in getting what was once the new thing. That value has been growing over the past few years as the gap between generations thins to the point of non-existence and even regression in some cases. Purchasing older products has now gone from strictly a cost-savings measure to a smart decision if you play your cards right.
The old thing is now the cheap thing

Mobile

How to fast charge your iPhone

iPhone lock screen

There are days when you can't put everything on hold to wait for your phone to finish charging. When that happens, you might be surprised to learn that you have options to reduce your iPhone's charging time significantly.

In this guide, we'll walk you through how to do it, from determining whether your phone has the capacity for fast charging to the equipment that will cut down your charge time.
What is fast charging, and why can't my charger do it?
We've written a comprehensive guide to fast charging, but let's review it. Fast charging uses a newer USB technology called USB Power Delivery (USB PD). This technology is only available in USB-C connections, which can route power as well as data and are suitable for charging a variety of devices. It's a very flexible and efficient option that can optimize power management. By upgrading to a USB PD connection, you can achieve charging speeds far faster than Apple's older Lightning cable connections.