A global outage affected the social networks of the Meta platform this Wednesday, December 11, 2024. Thousands of users could no longer access Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram.
A major outage affected the various Meta platforms this Wednesday, December 11, 2024 in the evening. Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, and Messenger were affected. Thousands of reports were reported on the specialized site Downdetector, where users complained in particular of not being able to connect or send a message, seeing their communications leave with a delay or even be deleted. The company confirmed that it was experiencing technical issues. And if the duration of the outage that Meta had to face was difficult to assess, it seems that since 8 p.m. a gradual return to normal has been noted. Shortly before 8 p.m., WhatsApp indicated on X that it was starting to “see a return to normal for most users” and expected “that things will return to normal shortly”.
“We are aware that a technical problem is affecting the ability of some users to access our applications. We are working to restore the situation as quickly as possible and we apologize for the inconvenience caused,” the firm said on Wednesday evening on the network social X. For the moment, Meta is unable to provide further information on the origin of the outage.
In 2021, a giant outage had already affected these platforms and lasted more than 6 hours. During this period of time, it was impossible to send or receive a message on the Facebook, Instagram or WhatsApp networks. Even worse, if you typed Facebook into a search engine, the page was nowhere to be found, as if the social network had disappeared from the internet world for a few hours.
23:27 – The end of the outage still not formally announced by Meta on social networks
If users seem to agree on the fact that the return to normal took place gradually this Wednesday evening, Meta, which had alerted of the problem on X, did not indicate on the social network that the outage was officially finished. It is also still unclear what the cause was.
22:49 – More than two hours of outage
As relayed Forbes On Wednesday evening, the Meta outage was global. It has therefore not only affected the use of the various social networks and applications of the French. Always according to Forbesthe outage lasted two hours and up to 538,000 reports were made about Facebook at the peak of the outage, more than 91,000 for Instagram, according to the New York Times.
22:30 – What about the situation on Instagram?
The social network which also paid the price for the outage at Meta this Wednesday evening seems to be recovering at the end of the evening. On Downdetector, just under 800 problems were reported, compared to more than 7,000 at the 7 p.m. peak. So we can’t quite speak of a return to normal yet, but it seems that we are on the right track.
22:14 – Almost back to normal on WhatsApp
A drastic drop in reports of problems on the WhatsApp application was observed shortly before 9 p.m. Since then, around a hundred, or even more than a few dozen, reports have been recorded on the site, proof that the situation seems to have stabilized and that the return “shortly” to normal, promised shortly before 8 p.m. by the WhatsApp teams , is indeed a reality.
9:49 p.m. – A little before 10 p.m., a return to normal on Facebook Messenger
As with WhatsApp, users were experiencing problems sending or receiving their messages: slowness, non-sending of messages, deletion. Again, the peak of reports on Downdetector was recorded around 7 p.m. Shortly before 10 p.m., more than around 200 reports were reported, compared to 1,500 at 7 p.m.
21:32 – Several peaks in reports observed on WhatsApp
After a first wave of reports of technical problems on WhatsApp around 7 p.m., an improvement was noted before a new peak, almost double the first, around 7:30 p.m. Again followed by an improvement, this second peak was then doubled by the third peak, around 8:20 p.m., which reached almost 4,000 reports. Concretely, messages sent by users take time to send (several tens of seconds, even minutes), notifications arrive late.
9:17 p.m. – Automatic disconnection, impossible connection… These problems reported on Facebook
As with WhatsApp, the peak in problem reports was recorded at 7 p.m., although around 8:30 p.m. the reports started to rise slightly again, before starting to decline again around 8:40 p.m. On Downdetector, an Internet user complains of “automatic disconnection” followed by an impossible connection. If another mentions their inability to upload photos to their Facebook page, overall, the connection problem seems to come up the most.
9:04 p.m. – Messaging and notification issues on Instagram
In France, the peak in reporting problems on Instagram seems to have passed. It took place around 7 p.m., with nearly 6,500 reports. On Downdetector, a user details problems with Instagram messaging: “Messages are sent late or deleted on their own. Notifications do not come or come late.”
20:58 – Boss of X, Elon Musk does not shy away from his pleasure in the face of competition problems
The boss of X did not fail to react this Wednesday evening to the breakdown which affects his rival Meta. “Meta announces technical problems and uses the X platform to announce the current service downtime,” he says on his social network, with a little hilarious emoji in support. And added: “You are reading this post because the X servers are working.”
20:51 – A return to normal announced for most WhatsApp users
“We are aware of certain problems accessing WhatsApp,” WhatsApp sur X said shortly before 8 p.m., while ensuring that the resolution of the problem was on track. “We are actively working on a solution and are starting to see a return to normal for most users. We expect things to return to normal shortly,” it was further indicated.
20:43 – An error message when connecting to Facebook
As Forbes relays, some Facebook users were sent an error message when connecting to the social network. “We are working to resolve this issue as soon as possible,” it said.
20:25 – On Facebook, a news feed that no longer updates
What does the outage look like on Facebook? For many Internet users, everything seems normal at first glance when connecting to the social network. But on closer inspection, it seems that the news feed isn’t really updated. The last publications are often several hours or even days old.
20:21 – Meta recognizes a “technical problem” and assures that it is working on it
On X, the Meta company says it is aware “that a technical problem is affecting the ability of certain users to access our applications”. And to indicate: “We are working to restore the situation as quickly as possible and we apologize for the inconvenience caused.” For the moment, the company does not give a time estimate for resolving the problem.
