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Human error caused mass Telstra outage

Telstra says it has identified a problem that crippled mobile phone and data services around Australia this afternoon.

The telco says it has restored the service of the "vast majority" of its customers after an "embarrassing human error" caused a nationwide outage which left millions with no service.

Telstra chief operations officer Kate McKenzie told Melbourne radio that the "correct procedure was unfortunately not followed” when working on one of the network’s 10 mobile nodes.

She said it caused massive “flow-on consequences”.

It is unclear how many of Telstra's 16.7 million mobile customers across the country were affected, however estimates put it in the millions.

Telstra suggested it would look at offering free data to its customers to make up for the inconvenience, which could cost the company millions.

Tens of thousands of customers saw their 4G and 3G mobile services drop out this afternoon with no warning.

The issue affected Telstra customers across Australia with reports of service failures coming in from all major cities and across the states and territories.

“We are aware of an issue currently affecting mobile voice and data nationally. We are working to resolve the issue as quickly as possible and thank customers for their patience," a spokesman for Telstra said in an earlier statement.

Users on social media quickly started reporting calls failing to phones on Telstra's mobile networks. Calls to other providers appeared to be functioning correctly.

Questions and outrage soon gave way to humour at the expense of Australia's largest telecommunications provider.

A service statement from Telsta says 4G and 3G services were affected.

"Some 3G/4G Mobile customers may experience difficulties making or receiving voice calls or using data services in this area," it reads.