But was this a result of a huge technical issue, a massive hacking effort from outside parties, or something else? Read on for the details below.
6-hour downtime
On Monday, October 4, 2021, users of Facebook Inc. services experienced anywhere from slowdowns to being completely cut off from accessing Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. Eventually, it became apparent that the situation was being experienced worldwide. Downdetector.com, a leading outage tracking web service, received thousands of reports of the Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp issue, to a total high of over 50,000 reports at one point. Users reported that trying to open any of the Facebook group of social media platforms led to a DNS error message. The situation was also not isolated to just the Facebook platforms. As many users have used their Facebook accounts as the default access to third-party apps, the outage also led to a similar inaccessibility. These include gamers who were attempting to log on to apps such as Pokemon Go. Concurrently, Facebook’s (NASDAQ: FB) stock plummeted with a 5.5% drop at one point. This would mark it as one of the worst single-day stock depreciations for the company in the past year.
Systems back up
After nearly 6 hours, services and activities on Facebook’s social media platforms began showing signs of restoration. As these operations for the social media platforms were restored, Facebook issued an apology through its official Twitter account:
— Facebook (@Facebook) October 4, 2021 However, it is noticeable that the post does not follow up with an explanation as to what the cause of the mishap was.
Controversies and pressure
It should be noted that Facebook is in the midst of hardline pressure from the U.S. government following leaked internal investigation results in relation to the lack of responsible monitoring and potential damage that social media platforms are causing to impressionable youths. Frances Haugen, former product manager on the civic misinformation team at Facebook, came into the spotlight the prior week. This is after the ex-Facebook employee accused the social media industry giant of putting higher priority on profits over its civic and ethical responsibilities. These include lax monitoring and responding to hate speech and disinformation rampant on personal and interest pages, with posts that support and promote such behavior which the company has allowed to prosper. Another issue raised by Haugen is the potential harm on youth’s mental health caused by its popular image-sharing platform Instagram, particularly teenage girls. Instagram has come under fire in recent years due to concerned groups pointing out the platform leads to impractical or even unrealistic image goals and what counts as beauty and success, particularly to impressionable young minds. Haugen appeared on CBS Television’s Sunday broadcast of 60 Minutes to share these controversial topics connected to a Wall Street Journal investigation and the upcoming Senate hearing on the matters raised. During the interview, Haugen was quoted as saying: In response, Facebook spokesperson Lena Pietsch issued a statement after the televised 60 Minutes interview: Haugen and her legal representatives have filed complaints to the U.S, Securities and Exchange Commission, as well as shared the contents of their investigation and findings to attorneys general in multiple states such as California, Tennessee, and Vermont.
Twitter triumphant
For now, it would be advisable to have alternate channels of social media communication. Non-Facebook platforms such as YouTube, Twitter, Discord, TikTok, Zoom, and others remained active during the former’s downtime. Coincidentally, Twitter experienced a high volume of activity during the period of time the Facebook social media group platforms were unavailable. In a bit of good-natured ribbing, the official Twitter account made a post that got other major companies and celebrities retweeting and responding, including McDonald’s, Microsoft, Google Play, Diablo, Dungeons & Dragons, Starbucks, Twitch, and even singer Adele and rock band Metallica:
— Twitter (@Twitter) October 4, 2021
— McDonald’s (@McDonalds) October 4, 2021
Hey everyone. — Microsoft Teams (@MicrosoftTeams) October 4, 2021
— Alexa (@alexa99) October 4, 2021
— Diablo (@Diablo) October 4, 2021
— Dungeons & Dragons (@Wizards_DnD) October 4, 2021
— Twitch (@Twitch) October 4, 2021
— Adele (@Adele) October 4, 2021
— Dell (@Dell) October 4, 2021
— Google Play (@GooglePlay) October 4, 2021
— The Sims (@TheSims) October 4, 2021
— WhatsApp (@WhatsApp) October 4, 2021
— Metallica (@Metallica) October 4, 2021 It is good to see that despite the doom and gloom from the Facebook social media outage, people and businesses can still find some lightheartedness and humor in the situation.
