Amazon Web Services (AWS) has confirmed it is tracking a massive issue that has rendered large parts of the internet unusable. AWS says it has identified and fixed the main issue causing the disruption, but it could be some time before all affected services are back to normal.
A not-infrequent occurrence, Amazon confirmed at around 3 AM ET that it was " increased error rates and latencies for multiple AWS services in the US-EAST-1 Region," adding around 90 minutes later, "We can confirm significant error rates for requests made to the DynamoDB endpoint in the US-EAST-1 Region."
At 5 am ET, AWS stated, "We have identified a potential root cause for error rates for the DynamoDB APIs in the US-EAST-1 Region. Based on our investigation, the issue appears to be related to DNS resolution of the DynamoDB API endpoint in US-EAST-1. We are working on multiple parallel paths to accelerate recovery. This issue also affects other AWS Services in the US-EAST-1 Region. Global services or features that rely on US-EAST-1 endpoints such as IAM updates and DynamoDB Global tables may also be experiencing issues. During this time, customers may be unable to create or update Support Cases. We recommend customers continue to retry any failed requests. We will continue to provide updates as we have more information to share, or by 2:45 AM."
AWS is the infrastructure underpinning much of the online world; as such, the outage is causing a cascade of issues online, with many users unable to access a wide range of services.
U.S. users of Downdetector are reporting issues with Snapchat, Roblox, Amazon, Alexa, Ring, Robinhood, Max (HBO), Chime, Venmo, Epic Games, McDonald's, Fortnite, Lyft, Hulu, Disney+, Roku, Signal, and carriers including AT&T, Verizon, and T-Mobile. PC gaming platform Steam, as well as online forums like Reddit, are also impacted.
Popular banking apps and tools like Zoom, Pokémon Go, PlayStation Network, and more are also struggling, as are some AI services such as Perplexity.
AWS stated at 5:20 am ET that it had applied initial mitigations and was observing signs of recovery, adding moments later, it was seeing "significant signs of recovery." Despite this, AWS says there is a backlog of queued requests to work through, so it may take some time for services you're trying to use to fully recover.
At 6am ET, AWS confirmed, "We continue to observe recovery across most of the affected AWS Services. We can confirm global services and features that rely on US-EAST-1 have also recovered. We continue to work towards full resolution and will provide updates as we have more information to share."
Stephen is Tom's Hardware's News Editor with almost a decade of industry experience covering technology, having worked at TechRadar, iMore, and even Apple over the years. He has covered the world of consumer tech from nearly every angle, including supply chain rumors, patents, and litigation, and more. When he's not at work, he loves reading about history and playing video games.
