Verizon service outage strands thousands of users in 'SOS' mode across US

American telecommunications company Verizon experienced significant outages on Monday, affecting thousands of users, particularly in cities like Chicago and Indianapolis . Many iPhone users reported that their devices were stuck in "SOS" mode.

According to Downdetector .com, the problems began around 9.30am ET, leading to over 66,000 outage reports by 12.28pm ET, affecting areas including Minneapolis, Phoenix, Omaha, and Denver, according to Reuters News Agency.

Verizon Communications acknowledged the issue, saying, "Our engineers are engaged and we are working quickly to identify and solve the issue." Many users took to social media platform X to express frustration, sharing that their phones displayed "SOS," indicating a lack of connection to the cellular network while still allowing emergency calls via other carriers.

What’s going on? @Verizon cell service is out for many customers in Arizona and the outage extends to other parts of the country. @VerizonSupport when will our service be back up? And WHAT is the cause of this outage?

— Kari Lake (@KariLake) September 30, 2024

In contrast, AT&T reported only 1,111 incident reports on the same outage tracker, but the carrier claimed it was not facing a nationwide issue. AT&T suggested that Downdetector’s data reflected challenges customers were having connecting with users on another network.

The news of the Verizon outage follows the company's recent announcement of a $3.3 billion deal to lease, operate, and manage 6,339 mobile towers across the US with infrastructure firm Vertical Bridge. In February, AT&T faced its own nationwide outage, affecting more than 70,000 customers and prompting an investigation by the Federal Communications Commission .