On Monday, a significant disruption originating from Amazon Web Services (AWS), the powerful cloud computing arm of Amazon, sent shockwaves across the internet. For over two hours, this issue rendered hundreds of websites and applications inaccessible, impacting everything from popular gaming platforms to essential entertainment services.
This widespread internet outage served as a stark reminder of how fragile our global technology infrastructure truly is. It underscored a critical vulnerability: when a single, widely utilized piece of technology like AWS experiences a problem, it has the power to bring systems worldwide to a grinding halt.
The issues first emerged shortly after 3 a.m. Eastern Time. By 5:27 a.m., Amazon announced that most of its services were showing “significant signs of recovery” and were largely back online. However, the company noted that there was still a “backlog of queued requests” that would require additional time to fully process.
Amazon’s engineers swiftly worked to contain the fallout and pinpoint the cause of the problem. An earlier statement from the company indicated that 28 of its services, particularly those within the “US-EAST-1” region, were experiencing difficulties.
Popular online outage tracker DownDetector quickly registered problems with dozens of high-profile sites and apps. These included major players like Amazon itself, along with digital payment service Venmo, streaming giant Hulu, global fast-food chain McDonald’s, and cryptocurrency platform Coinbase. Several companies explicitly confirmed AWS as the root cause of their service interruptions.
Coinbase, for instance, informed users on social media that many were “currently unable to access Coinbase due to an AWS outage,” reassuring them that their “team is working on the issue and we’ll provide updates here. All funds are safe.” Similarly, A.I. startup Perplexity’s CEO, Aravind Srinivas, stated, “The root cause is an AWS issue. We’re working on resolving it.”
What Exactly is Amazon Web Services?
Amazon Web Services is a colossal cloud computing division that emerged from Amazon’s own robust internal technology infrastructure. Originally built to handle the e-commerce giant’s vast and often unconventional demands, this technology proved exceptionally capable of managing immense user traffic and complex, data-intensive tasks like video streaming, web application hosting, and massive data storage.
Recognizing the immense potential, Amazon expanded these capabilities, offering to rent them out to other organizations. This strategic move transformed AWS into a cornerstone of the modern internet. Its global infrastructure allows businesses to scale their services up or down as needed without the prohibitive costs of investing in their own physical hardware.
The extensive list of services impacted by Monday’s outage—including Zoom, Duolingo, Fortnite, and even some games from The New York Times—demonstrates just how deeply integrated AWS is into the fabric of the internet. Beyond consumer apps, it also powers critical operations for banks, healthcare providers, and transportation companies worldwide.
Impact and Broader Implications
Despite the widespread disruption, early market reactions were muted, with Amazon’s share price showing little movement in premarket trading. Air travel also remained largely unaffected, according to FlightAware, even though DownDetector noted disruptions for major airlines like Delta and United.
However, the outage did raise significant concerns among media advocates. Corinne Cath-Speth, head of digital for Article 19, a free speech advocacy group, highlighted that the disruption to secure communication apps like Signal underscored the risks associated with the internet’s heavy reliance on a handful of dominant technology companies. She emphasized the urgent need for “diversification in cloud computing.”
As the situation stabilized, AWS reported that the severity of the incident had been “degraded,” with most services showing recovery. While some lingering “backlogs of queued requests” were expected, broader internet disruptions, affecting services like Slack, Snapchat, and Reddit, appeared to be easing.
A Partial List of Affected Services:
The list of affected platforms included a diverse range of services, impacting millions globally:
- Amazon
- Venmo
- Hulu
- McDonald’s
- Coinbase
- Snapchat
- Ring
- Roblox
- Zoom
- Lloyd’s Bank
- Bank of Scotland
- Signal
- Gov.uk
- Wordle
- Slack
- Canva
- Fortnite
- Tidal
- Duolingo
- Microsoft365
- PokemonGo
- Strava
This incident, much like a past faulty update from cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike in July 2024, vividly illustrates the interconnected and vulnerable nature of our digital world. A single point of failure within a critical provider like AWS can cascade into global chaos.