A statewide 911 outage in Massachusetts on Tuesday, June 18, 2024, lasted over an hour and affected emergency services across the state. The cause of the disruption was a firewall system designed to protect against cyberattacks and hacking. According to reports from various sources, including the Massachusetts Executive Office of Public Safety and Security and local news outlets, dispatch centers were still able to identify callers' phone numbers and return their calls during the outage. No emergencies were reported as impacted by the interruption.
The exact reason why the firewall stopped calls from reaching dispatch centers remains under investigation. The Massachusetts State 911 Department moved quickly to address the issue, reaching out to its vendor, Comtech, for a technical solution to prevent future occurrences. Officials also contacted local law enforcement departments and issued statewide emergency alerts.
Residents were advised to contact their local public safety business lines directly if they had emergencies during the outage. Some residents in Maine and New Hampshire also received false alarms about a statewide 911 outage due to a temporary issue with T-Mobile's network.
The Massachusetts 911 system was restored later in the day, allowing residents to resume calling emergency services as needed.
This is not the first time Massachusetts has experienced issues with its 911 system. In April 2024, portions of the system broke down due to a network issue, leaving about 50 public safety answering points (PSAPs) without service for several hours. The state used an emergency cellphone alert service operated by Burlington-based Everbridge to warn people about the outage.
The Massachusetts State 911 Department is committed to providing reliable, state-of-the-art 911 services to all Massachusetts residents and visitors in an emergency. The department will take all necessary steps to prevent future occurrences.
