Telecom - Staff Letter addressed to Stephen Schmidt (TELUS Communications Inc.)
Gatineau, 11 April 2025
Reference: 8000-C12-201909780
BY EMAIL
Stephen Schmidt
Vice-President – Telecom Policy & Chief Regulatory Legal Counsel
Telecom Policy & Regulatory Affairs
Telus Communications Inc.
Floor 5, 215 Slater St.
Ottawa, Ontario K1P 0A6
regulatory.affairs@telus.com
Subject: Filing by TELUS Communications Inc. of Post-Incident Report about a March 22, 2025 to March 24, 2025 outage impacting wireless traffic from reaching the Brandon Public Safety Communications Centre in Manitoba
Dear Stephen Schmidt,
Thank you for your 8 April 2025 filing of a post-incident report on behalf of TELUS Communications Inc. (Telus).
That filing relates to an outage covering the period of 22-24 March 2025, during which users of Telus’ cellphone services in Brandon, Manitoba and the surrounding areas could not access 9-1-1. As you know, all 9-1-1 outages have significant effects on public safety. The CRTC is deeply concerned and takes all 9-1-1 outages very seriously.
Telus’ filing contains two versions of its post-incident report. The first version contains information that Telus has designated as confidential, and the second is an abridged version intended for publication on the CRTC’s website. The abridged version redacts many of the details of the outage, its causes, and its effects.
There is a public interest in having as much information as possible on the public record, both from the perspective of informing Canadians of what happened and in helping other telecom providers avoid similar outages. It also appears that some information that Telus initially designated as confidential has since been made public, including through media reports. For these reasons, CRTC staff asks Telus to review its redactions and submit an updated abridged report no later than 16 April 2025. Through this updated report, Telus should disclose as much information as possible onto the public record.
Additionally, CRTC staff understands that Telus is continuing to investigate this outage. CRTC staff requests that Telus provide the CRTC with progress reports on the investigation on a weekly basis, beginning 16 April 2025. In responding to this request, Telus should:
- provide updated information in each progress report on the cause of the outage, steps taken to resolve the outage, the impact of the outage (including the lack of 9-1-1 service during the outage), and plans put in place to prevent similar outages in the future;
- disclose as much information as possible and, if necessary, provide an abridged version of each progress report so that the CRTC can place this information on the public record for the benefit of both Canadians and other providers; and
- continue to file progress reports on a weekly basis until CRTC staff is satisfied that there is a definitive understanding of the outage.
I want to thank Telus in advance for its efforts to uncover and share both the cause and effects of this outage, consistent with the requirements of Telecom Notice of Consultation 2023-39. If you wish to discuss this matter further, please reach out directly to Noah Moser, Director General for Costing and Regulatory Implementation, at noah.moser@crtc.gc.ca.
Yours sincerely,
Originally signed by
Leila Wright
Vice-President, Telecommunications Sector
Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC)
c.c.: Noah Moser, CRTC, noah.moser@crtc.gc.ca
Ian Baggley, CRTC, ian.baggley@crtc.gc.ca
Aysha Omar, CRTC, aysha.omar@crtc.gc.ca
- Date modified: