Software issue knocked out 911 service for several provinces last month, Bell report says

A 911 outage that lasted nearly an hour and a half in several Canadian provinces last month was caused by a previously undetected bug in Bell's software, the company said in a report on Friday.

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A person uses a phone in downtown Vancouver in 2020. Bell said a 'latent software issue' caused an 87-minute 911 outage in six provinces last month. (Ben Nelms/CBC)

A 911 outage that lasted nearly an hour and a half in several Canadian provinces last month was caused by a previously undetected bug in Bell's software, the company said in a report on Friday.

The report said a "latent software issue" triggered the outage across Manitoba, Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island at 3:13 a.m. ET on Sept. 17.

"At the outset, we note that this incident was not a cyber attack and did not result from any change activity, planned or unplanned," Philippe Gauvin, assistant general counsel for Bell, wrote in the report to the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC).

The software bug affected components of Bell's next generation 911 system, known as NG9-1-1, Gauvin said. The service is designed to allow the public to send more detailed information about emergencies to dispatchers to help police, fire and paramedics better understand an emergency before arriving at the scene.

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