Significant Web Disruption Hits Dozens Websites and Applications

An extensive online outage has disrupted many sites and apps around the world, and users noting troubles accessing the internet after problems at the cloud computing service.

The disrupted apps comprise Snapchat, the gaming platform Roblox, Signal, and Duolingo, as well as a host of Amazon-owned services including its primary shopping website and the Ring doorbell company.

Across the United Kingdom, Lloyds bank was disrupted as well as its branches Halifax and Bank of Scotland, while there were additional accounts of difficulties accessing the HM Revenue and Customs online portal on the start of the week. Also in the UK, several Ring customers turned to networks to report their doorbells were malfunctioning.

In the UK alone, reports of problems on specific platforms ran into the thousands for every service.

Amazon reported that the issue started in the Atlantic coast of the United States at the cloud division, a section that provides vital web infrastructure for a host of businesses, who utilize resources on Amazon servers. Amazon Web Services is the most extensive online services system.

Soon after late night (PDT) in the US (morning UK time), Amazon confirmed “higher problem frequencies and slowdowns” for the cloud services in a region on the Atlantic seaboard of the US. The ripple effect was seen to affect platforms globally, and the outage tracking website indicating issues with the same sites in multiple continents.

The monitoring service Thousand Eyes, a service that tracks online failures, additionally noted a increase in outages on the start of the week, with many of them located in the Virginia area, the location of the eastern US data center where officials confirmed the problems began.