Vodafone mobile phone network crippled after break-in By Christopher Williams

 Many Vodafone customers were left unable to make phone calls this morning, after the mobile phone network was targeted by burglars.

                                        Vodafone has 3.2 million UK subscribers. Photo: PA

 

 

 An overnight break-in at a Vodafone technical facility caused major disruption, with voice, text and mobile internet services all unavailable.
 It was unclear this morning how many people were affected, but the volume of users posting complaints on social networking websites like Twitter indicated that the problems were widespread.

 A spokeswoman said: "We had a break-in last night at one of our technical facilities which resulted in damage done to some of our equipment.

 "This means that some customers may be experiencing temporary loss of voice, sms and internet services. We are working quickly to restore these and will be back to normal as soon as we can."

 The break-in targeted Vodafone's Basingstoke data centre, a major hub for the network, where it would have had routing equipment worth many millions of pounds.

 Stolen networking gear is often destined for eastern Europe, via organised crime gangs.

 Vodafone reassured customers that the break-in would have no impact on privacy.

 Austin Clark, a recruitment consultancy based in Wokingham, Berkshire, was among those annoyed by the outage.

 "All of the candidates that I need to speak to re interviews seem to be on Vodafone network which isn't particularly handy, I'll be honest!," said co-owner Stephanie Clark on Twitter.

 "It's days like today when you wonder how we ever lived without a mobile phone?"

 Another Vodafone user said: "My phone does that looking like it's searching thing and then still says no service. Expecting blood tests results. Damn you #vodafone."

 ©telegraph.co.uk