The fallout of the 2022 Rogers outage continues to inform the CRTC’s policy development around network resilience and consumer protection
The CRTC has published a decision and two further consultations aimed at building out its stance on network resilience
On 4 September 2025, the Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) published a package of regulatory measures aimed at improving network resilience and protecting consumers during network outages. The suite of changes included a decision on new reporting requirements for operators during outages, a consultation on resilience standards in network design and management, and a consultation on consumer protections related to transparency and compensation in the event of service interruption. In addition to supporting its broader Consumer Protections Action Plan, the CRTC notes that these measures also build upon decisions earlier this year on protecting access to emergency services and improving resiliency in rural regions of the country. The consultation on consumer protections during outages will remain open until 13 November 2025, and the consultation on improving network resilience will remain open to feedback until 3 December 2025.
Operators will be required to report all major outages to the regulator and the Government
The CRTC’s decision on notification requirements during outages creates new obligations for operators in alerting public authorities of a large-scale loss of service and completing after-action reporting following incidents. In the event of a general outage lasting longer than 30 minutes and resulting in a minimum of 600,000 user-minutes affected (calculated by multiplying total users affected by the length of the outage), operators will be required to alert the CRTC, the Government via Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada (ISED), emergency management organisations and emergency call centres (referred to as 911 centres) within two hours. Operators will also be required to notify authorities if an outage results in an “community isolation event” where service is lost in a remote, isolated or rural community as well as if an outage results in a loss of access to emergency services to any number of consumers. The CRTC will now mandate that operators submit a post-outage report within 30 days of a major service loss, detailing the cause of the outage, the scale of the impact of the outage and the lessons learned and mitigation measures planned by the operator to prevent similar incidents in the future. These measures should be largely familiar to operators in Canada, as they were originally introduced by the CRTC through an interim measure issued in March 2023, following the 2022 Rogers outage that resulted in a 15-hour long loss of service for millions of consumers. Now finalised following consultation, these measures will be permanently in force as of 4 November 2025.
Mandated battery back-up may be on the way
In its consultation on network resilience, the CRTC poses a series of questions on designing and maintaining secure networks, all underlined by a series of proposed principles, which include:
Striving for uninterrupted service availability;
Designing networks capable of withstanding a variety of types of disruptions;
Fostering reliable relationships with vendors and suppliers; and
Participating in mutual support during incidents.
The regulator identifies a series of threats to both network software and hardware, such as cyberattacks, security breaches, extreme weather, theft and vandalism, against which operators should secure their systems. Similar to a number of other regulators around the world concerned with the impacts of climate change and the increasing severity of weather events, the CRTC poses a series of questions on how operators should be expected to ensure uninterrupted power supply within their networks, through battery back-up solutions or also solar panels and fuel-powered generators. The regulator also considers the need to mandate the provision of battery back-up units with consumers’ in-home equipment, suggesting a concern with the susceptibility of fibre networks to power outages at consumers’ premises. Again similar to the perspective of global regulators and governments on the role of satellite infrastructure in communications networks, the CRTC asks for further feedback on how satellite connectivity can better secure both backhaul transmission and mobile connectivity in the event of terrestrial outages. Given the included section on structuring regulatory enforcement, the CRTC appears poised to issue binding obligations on some or all of these measures through its eventual decision.
The CRTC is considering a compensation scheme to make consumers whole after service interruptions
Through its consultation on consumer protection during outages, the CRTC asked for further information to inform the possible development of a refund policy for service interruptions as well as standards for communicating with consumers during an incident. After requesting general information on the existing compensation and communications policies of operators, the regulator suggests that it may regulate a requirement to proactively communicate with consumers during both planned and unplanned outages. It seeks further feedback on the channels through which communication should occur as well as whether operators would be required to reach only their own customers or if wider communications on outages are necessary. Regarding refunds for service interruptions, the CRTC considers its ability to mandate how refunds may be calculated, how operators would be required to pay (i.e. in the form of a bill credit vs. direct payment), whether consumers would be required to request compensation, if refunds should be charged for all services impacted within a bundle and whether the amount of a refund should reflect the impact of the outage, such as through accounting for a small business’s loss of revenue. Given the existence of the Commission for Complaints for Telecom-television Services (CCTS), which acts as the industry ombudsman, the CRTC does question what if any role it should have in directly administering a refund framework or if the CCTS should take on this responsibility.
