WhatsApp Breaks Silence On Outage, Which Also Affected Facebook & Instagram

META is having some technical issues as Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp are all down for thousands of individuals around the world.

For those who don't know, META owns several social media platforms including Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp. Their mission is to "give people the power to build community and bring the world closer together."

However, the company has faced controversy over issues related to user privacy, data protection, and content moderation.

Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp have become the new norm as so many people can be addicted to their phones and scroll for hours and hours (and the next thing they know, it's dinner time.)

Unfortunately for some, scrolling cannot happen on Wednesday as outages for all three apps have been reported. The first outages started around 2:00 p.m. ET and continue to cause issues for many, according to DownDetector. The website further states there were about 12,000 incidents of U.S. users reporting issues alone.

Over 20,000 users in India, approximately 46,000 users in the United Kingdom, and over 42,000 individuals in Brazil have also reported problems.

Shortly after Instagram, Facebook, and WhatsApp went down, both Instagram and WhatsApp began trending as users were thrown into a frenzy.

"Everyone is running to Twitter X as in an earthquake when #WhatsApp goes down!" one X user wrote.

Another said, "People rushing to Twitter X if #WhatsApp is down."

"People coming to Twitter only to check if Whatsapp and Instagram are actually down," a third wrote.

This is not the first time the social media platforms have gone down for an extended period of time.

While thousands are reporting the outage, it is not affecting every user, as some of The Blast reporters can still access the social media platforms.

WhatsApp has released a statement: "We know some people are experiencing issues right now, we're working on getting things back to 100% for everyone as quickly as possible."

The platform is a widely used messaging app that allows users to send text messages, and voice messages, make voice and video calls, and share images, and other media files. WhatsApp works across different mobile operating systems including iOS, Android, and Windows Phone.

It does not appear that Facebook or Instagram have commented on the outage at this time.

In 2022, Mark Zuckerbergannounced cuts to META employees, writing in a letter:

 "Today I’m sharing some of the most difficult changes we’ve made in META's history. I’ve decided to reduce the size of our team by about 13% and let more than 11,000 of our talented employees go. We are also taking a number of additional steps to become a leaner and more efficient company by cutting discretionary spending and extending our hiring freeze through Q1. I want to take accountability for these decisions and for how we got here. I know this is tough for everyone, and I’m especially sorry to those impacted."

Later in the letter addressed to META employees, he stated:

"I believe we are deeply underestimated as a company today. Billions of people use our services to connect, and our communities keep growing. Our core business is among the most profitable ever built with huge potential ahead. And we’re leading in developing the technology to define the future of social connection and the next computing platform. We do historically important work. I’m confident that if we work efficiently, we’ll come out of this downturn stronger and more resilient than ever."

Dozens of workers have been rehired since META cut 25% of its workforce in 2022-2023.

META has also remained silent on this recent outage, but this is not the first time META has been down recently.

On March 5 they released a statement: "We know some people were having trouble accessing our apps earlier. Apologies for any inconvenience this may have caused, and thank you for your patience while our teams worked quickly to resolve!"

META Platforms, Inc., formerly known as Facebook, Inc., is a technology company founded by Mark Zuckerberg, along with his college roommates and fellow Harvard University students in 2004. META is now one of the world's largest companies and operates several social media platforms.

As of 3:16 p.m. ET, it is unclear what caused this most recent outage.