“The abruptness of today’s outage highlights the staggering level of precarity that structures our increasingly digitally mediated work economy.” “Today’s outage brought our reliance on Facebook - and its properties like WhatsApp and Instagram - into sharp relief,” said Brooke Erin Duffy, a professor of communications at Cornell University.

Amazon: The company paused plans to build a second headquarters in Virginia, the latest reminder of the tech industry’s slowdown and the pandemic’s toll on in-office work.

Those working on such projects were hit hard in recent layoffs.

Bad Bets: Big tech companies have long been willing to fund efforts with no obvious payoff.

Silicon Valley Bank: The sudden collapse of Silicon Valley Bank has set off panic across the tech world, rattling a start-up industry already on edge.

Meta: The company said that it planned to lay off about 10,000 employees, or roughly 13 percent of its work force - another round of job cuts after it laid off more than 11,000 people in November.

More than 3.5 billion people around the world use Facebook, Instagram, Messenger and WhatsApp to communicate with friends and family, distribute political messaging, and expand their businesses through advertising and outreach.įacebook is also used to sign in to many other apps and services, leading to unexpected domino effects such as people not being able to log into shopping websites or sign into their smart TVs, thermostats and other internet-connected devices. In some countries, like Myanmar and India, Facebook is synonymous with the internet. Facebook has built itself into a linchpin platform with messaging, livestreaming, virtual reality and many other digital services. The outage lasted over five hours, before some apps slowly flickered back to life, though the company cautioned the services would take time to stabilize.Įven so, the impact was far-reaching and severe. Within minutes, Facebook had disappeared from the internet. SAN FRANCISCO - Facebook and its family of apps, including Instagram and WhatsApp, were inaccessible for hours on Monday, taking out a vital communications platform used by billions and showcasing just how dependent the world has become on a company that is under intense scrutiny.įacebook’s apps - which include Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, Messenger and Oculus - began displaying error messages around 11:40 a.m.

Facebook messenger issues