Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram Prolonged Downtime: Facts and Impacts

A news report on a recent outage to the apps managed by Facebook inc.

Oct. 6, 2021, 1:17 p.m.

TL;DR

Facebook group is experiencing the largest downtime in recent times to their apps. The group has not released an official statement, and speculations are ongoing on what could be the cause.

The app used by the organization's staff for their activities, Facebook Workplace, is also down.

Key Facts

1
Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp experienced a downtime.
2
User data is more susceptible to attack from hackers.
3
A further drop is being noticed in the price of stocks since the outage.
4
A DNS fail was noticed due to routes being withdrawn from the internet.

Details

The biggest Facebook outage was experienced with users unable to access the app from their devices all over the world. The downtime, which started at about 11:40 EDT on Monday 4th, October 2021, was noticed first on Facebook and Instagram before its sister app, WhatsApp, followed shortly. The app used by the organization's staff for their activities, Facebook Workplace, is also down.

The company released a statement via their Twitter page saying

We’re aware that some people are having trouble accessing our apps and products. We’re working to get things back to normal as quickly as possible, and we apologize for any inconvenience.
— Facebook (@Facebook) October 4, 2021

This has been the only information released since the outage, which has passed more hours than any other outage. Apologies similar to this one also noticed on the Twitter accounts of WhatsApp and Instagram.

This outage is coming after various catastrophes happening to the group, with their stocks dropping rapidly and dripping even further with the outage. The drop in stock prices had been triggered earlier by a whistleblower, Haugen Frances, who released inside documents to the press. The cooperation has also been receiving backlash from millions of people following these leaked documents, which showed that the safety of users was not prioritized by the company as much as it should be.

This downtime would affect the routines of lots of users as the majority use this platform as a primary means of communicating with their family and loved ones. Businesses that operate using Instagram and Facebook would be affected. Facebook users would start seeking alternate options from competitors as downtimes of this scale affect users' trust, and rebuilding will take a while.

Many other apps, including Twitter, have noticed a surge in users and have released comic statements regarding this. Network providers like T-mobile have released statements telling users that the problem is not with them but with third-party apps.

The downtime lasted for 6 hours, and users can now access these apps. Facebook is yet to inform the public on what went wrong. However, it was noticed that the DNS servers were affected due to several routes being withdrawn from the internet.