Singtel fined $1m for three-day outage in March caused by chiller system failure, software bugs

Investigations conducted by IMDA found that the outages were within Singtel’s control to prevent.

ST PHOTO: KUA CHEE SIONG

Published Oct 20, 2026, 05:30 PM

Updated Oct 20, 2026, 05:30 PM

SINGAPORE - Singtel has been fined $1 million for a massive mobile network outage that affected 720,000 customers over three days in March .

This follows an earlier major fine: in Dec 2025, sector regulator Infocomm Media Development Authority (IMDA) handed the telco a $1 million financial penalty for a fixed voice service outage that affected 500,000 users for more than four hours in October 2024.

The most recent outage that took place on March 16, 18, and 19 disrupted online payments, ride-hailing, and food delivery, among other essential services.

In a statement on Oct 20, IMDA said that its investigations found that the March 16 outage was due to a chiller system breakdown at a Singtel Exchange. It caused mobile network equipment to overheat and shut down.

A vendor’s failure to follow standard operating procedure to reopen a manual valve that controls water flow after a scheduled maintenance, and the lack of active monitoring by Singtel, led to the equipment overheating , said IMDA.

An exchange is where telcos house telecommunications equipment, fibre-optic distribution cables, and infrastructure that route broadband and mobile network traffic.

Following the initial disruption, 5G mobile traffic was redirected to another Singtel Exchange, which had a disabled network packet optimiser and a software bug . Thus, this exchange could not handle the increased mobile traffic, resulting in intermittent connectivity for some Singtel subscribers on March 18 and 19.

“(Our) investigation concluded that the incidents were within Singtel’s control to prevent, and that they were not due to a cyber attack,” said IMDA.

“The service disruption on March 16 could have been prevented if Singtel had implemented robust frameworks, procedures, and systems to better monitor the operations of its chiller system at the affected Exchange.”

It added that disruption on the following two days could have been avoided if Singtel had done its due diligence to ensure that its Exchange was able to handle increased traffic load.

In determining the financial penalty, IMDA said it accounted for the “significant” scale and impact of disruptions given the number of subscribers affected.

However, it added that other factors were also taken into consideration. These factors include Singtel’s cooperation during investigations, efforts to progressively restore mobile services and goodwill rebates totaling $8 million given to affected subscribers.

Singtel is Singapore’s largest telco by a wide margin, commanding around 4.5 million mobile subscribers. This is followed by StarHub (2.2 million), M1 (1.6 million) and Simba Telecom (1.4 million).

The telco has also taken necessary remediation measures to prevent such incidents from recurring, said IMDA. These include beefing up maintenance procedures and chiller system monitoring and testing its network backup systems to ensure they trigger properly during a failure.

In a statement on Oct 20, Singtel Singapore’s chief executive Ng Tian Chong said the company accepts IMDA’s ruling on the matter, and the financial penalty.

“We deeply regret the disruption and the inconvenience caused to our customers,” said Ng. “Network reliability and resiliency have always been a top priority for us, and we are committed to continuing to strengthen our systems to provide reliable essential connectivity services to our customers.”

During its most recent fixed voice service outage in Oct 2024 that affected 500,000 users for more than four hours, calls to some government agencies, healthcare organisations, banks, and emergency hotlines were disrupted.

Rivals M1 and Starhub were fined a total of $610,000 in 2020, for Internet service disruptions during the circuit breaker period, which affected many Singaporeans working from home or attending home-based learning.

On Dec 3, 2016, an islandwide fibre broadband outage that cut off some 490,000 Singtel users from the Web led to a fine of $500,000.

The largest telco fine in Singapore’s history, totaling $6 million, was meted out in May 2014 to Singtel over a fire at its Bukit Panjang exchange in Oct 2013. That incident triggered an unprecedented islandwide outage that disrupted phone lines, banking payments, and internet services across Singapore for eight days before being fully restored.

IMDA/Infocomm Media Development Authority

新加坡资讯通信媒体发展局 (IMDA) 的调查发现，这些网络中断原本是新加坡电信可以避免的。

《海峡时报》摄影：郭志雄

发布于2026年10月20日下午5:30

更新于2026年10月20日下午5:30

新加坡——新加坡电信因3月份发生的大规模移动网络中断事件被罚款100万美元，该事件影响了72万名用户，持续了三天。

此前，该公司曾被处以巨额罚款：2025 年 12 月，行业监管机构新加坡资讯通信媒体发展局 (IMDA) 因该公司在 2024 年 10 月发生固定语音服务中断，影响 50 万用户超过 4 小时，对其处以 100 万美元的罚款。

3 月 16 日、18 日和 19 日发生的最近一次网络中断导致在线支付、网约车和外卖等基本服务中断。

新加坡资讯通信媒体发展局（IMDA）在10月20日发表声明称，调查发现3月16日的网络中断是由于新加坡电信（Singtel）交换中心的冷却系统故障造成的。故障导致移动网络设备过热并关闭。

新加坡资讯通信媒体发展局 (IMDA) 表示，供应商在计划维护后未能按照标准操作程序重新打开控制水流的手动阀门，以及新加坡电信 (Singtel) 缺乏主动监控，导致设备过热。

交换机是电信公司存放电信设备、光纤分配电缆以及路由宽带和移动网络流量的基础设施的地方。

最初的网络中断之后，5G移动流量被重定向到另一个新加坡电信交换机，但该交换机的网络数据包优化器已禁用且存在软件漏洞。因此，该交换机无法处理激增的移动流量，导致部分新加坡电信用户在3月18日和19日出现间歇性网络连接中断。

新加坡资讯通信媒体发展局表示：“（我们的）调查结论是，这些事件在新加坡电信的控制范围内，可以预防，而且并非网络攻击所致。”

“如果新加坡电信在受影响的交易所实施了健全的框架、程序和系统，以更好地监控其冷水机组的运行，那么3月16日的服务中断是可以避免的。”

该公司还补充说，如果新加坡电信事先尽职调查，确保其交换机能够处理增加的流量负载，那么接下来两天的网络中断是可以避免的。

在确定罚款金额时，IMDA表示，考虑到受影响的用户数量，已将中断的“重大”规模和影响考虑在内。

不过，声明还补充说，其他因素也纳入了考量。这些因素包括新加坡电信在调查期间的配合、逐步恢复移动服务的努力，以及向受影响用户提供的总计800万美元的善意补偿。

新加坡电信（Singtel）是新加坡最大的电信公司，拥有约450万移动用户，遥遥领先于其他公司。紧随其后的是星和电信（StarHub，220万）、M1（160万）和新巴电信（Simba Telecom，140万）。

新加坡资讯通信媒体发展局（IMDA）表示，该电信公司已采取必要的补救措施，以防止此类事件再次发生。这些措施包括加强维护程序和冷水机组系统的监控，以及测试其网络备份系统，以确保在发生故障时能够正确启动。

10月20日，新加坡电信首席执行官黄天冲在一份声明中表示，公司接受新加坡资讯通信媒体发展局（IMDA）对此事的裁决和罚款。

“我们对此次中断给客户带来的不便深表歉意，”吴先生表示。“网络可靠性和弹性一直是我们的首要任务，我们将继续加强系统建设，为客户提供可靠的关键连接服务。”

在 2024 年 10 月最近一次固定语音服务中断期间，50 万用户受到影响，持续超过四个小时，一些政府机构、医疗机构、银行和紧急热线的呼叫也因此中断。

2020 年，竞争对手 M1 和 Starhub 因在阻断措施期间互联网服务中断而被罚款共计 61 万美元，这影响了许多在家工作或在家学习的新加坡人。

2016 年 12 月 3 日，新加坡电信发生全岛光纤宽带中断事件，导致约 49 万新加坡电信用户无法上网，最终被罚款 50 万美元。

2014 年 5 月，新加坡电信公司 Singtel 因其位于武吉班让的交换中心在 2013 年 10 月发生火灾而被处以新加坡历史上最高的电信罚款，总额达 600 万美元。该事件引发了史无前例的全岛性停电，导致新加坡的电话线路、银行支付和互联网服务中断了八天，之后才完全恢复。

新加坡资讯通信媒体发展局/IMDA