Roundup: Optus network outage plunges millions of Australians into turmoil

SYDNEY, Nov. 8 (Xinhua) -- Millions of Australians woke up on Wednesday morning with their mobile phones displaying "SOS" in the status bar, as the second-largest telecommunications company in Australia was plagued by a nationwide service outage.

With a customer base of over 10 million people and 400,000 businesses nationwide, the Optus network handles about 51.3 million mobile calls and 51 million SMS messages on a typical day.