Social media platforms Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram are back online after going down following a run of technical issues that halted access to the applications for hours.
People experienced trouble accessing the Facebook-owned apps after the company’s central software system apparently nose-dived leading to an unscheduled shutdown.
Downdetector, a platform that monitors outages on the internet, revealed that all Facebook platforms started malfunctioning sometime after 8 pm Pakistan time. Some Facebook users were able to sign in to the app, but most of the reports on Downdetector suggested there was a complete blackout.
As often is the case with these outages, this one hit randomly all over the world, disrupting social networking for users. To that effect, users took to Twitter to express their frustration at not being able to connect with friends, family, and colleagues.
It is worth mentioning that the last major outage of a Facebook platform, in January, saw Instagram’s website and app go down for roughly two hours all over the world.