Some of the world’s most popular apps — including Canva, Snapchat, Zoom, Duolingo, and Fortnite — as well as banking services in the United Kingdom (such as Lloyd’s and Halifax) went down today due to an outage affecting Amazon Web Services (AWS), with over 6,5 million user reports of disruptions (compared to the daily average of 1.8 million) across more than 1.00 services on the Downdetector platform.
AWS, Amazon’s cloud service that supports the websites and apps of millions of major companies worldwide, stated that “significant signs of recovery are being observed,” though reports of issues continue to appear on newer platforms such as Reddit.
This is the first major “internet outage” since the CrowdStrike malfunction in July 2024, which had paralyzed airport and hospital systems around the world.
The cause of the outage remains unknown, but early reports from the company suggest it is related to the DNS (Domain Name System). DNS is often described as the “phonebook” of the internet, as it translates website names into their corresponding IP addresses, allowing computers to recognize and locate them.
It is the first major “internet blackout” in over a year, following the July 2024 CrowdStrike malfunction that brought airports, hospitals, and banks worldwide to a standstill.
Sources: BBC, Reuters
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