Major outage: Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp down globally

The social media platforms Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, and Messenger were unavailable for millions of users around the world due to a major outage. Although the reason is not known, the error message on Facebook’s webpage suggested a Domain Name System (DNS) error.

WhatsApp and Facebook took to Twitter, saying it is working to get things back to normal.

We’re aware that some people are experiencing issues with WhatsApp at the moment. We’re working to get things back to normal and will send an update here as soon as possible.

Thanks for your patience!

— WhatsApp (@WhatsApp) October 4, 2021

According to downdetector.com, the three social media networks appeared to be having widespread issues around 11:40 a.m. eastern time. The crowdsourced website that tracks online outages said there were more than 50,000 reports of problems with Facebook and Instagram. The outage may have affected a larger number of users.

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

After the outages impacted the services, users started complaining on Twitter about the disruptions.

Read: Facebook chief technology officer Mike Schroepfer to step down