WhatsApp resumes services three hours after global outage

WhatsApp has resumed its services roughly three hours after it faced a global outage, affecting users in India, Europe, Indonesia and other parts of the world on Sunday (January 19). Soon, the hashtag ‘whatsappdown’ was found trending on Twitter.

Users complained they were unable to share multimedia, such as photos, GIFs and stickers, over the instant messaging platform, whereas no interruptions were reported regarding text messages. WhatsApp’s Status was also not functioning properly, according to users.

Tracking website Downdetector said WhatsApp witnessed a big spike in reports of an outage around 4:15 pm on Sunday. According to a live outage map, WhatsApp users are facing issues in India, Europe, Malaysia, Brazil and Indonesia.

Also read| On New Year’s Eve, WhatsApp users sent over 100 billion messages

Outage.report, another tracking website, said it received 2,853 reports of outages originating from India, UK, France, Singapore, Malaysia, and 109 more countries. Reports suggest users in the United States too faced issues with WhatsApp during this time.

Meanwhile, Twitterati came up with hilarious memes on the WhatsApp outage:

Checks Data balance.
Checks balance again.
Comes out of the house searching for network.
Activates flight mode for a while.
Reboots phone.
Restarts phone.
Only to realise #whatsappdown pic.twitter.com/9Jm81j3ZVp

— мαѕтєя cчвσrg? (@VJ_Cyborg) January 19, 2020

Me rushing to twitter to confirm whether whatsapp is down? #WhatsAppDown pic.twitter.com/f5u3vtiP8q

— Og TRYCE (@slimpablo5) January 19, 2020

Also read | Ayodhya verdict: WhatsApp groups switch to ‘admin-only’ mode