A massive internet outage sent shockwaves across the globe on Monday morning after Amazon Web Services (AWS) — the backbone of much of the internet — went down, leaving millions
unable to access everything from banking apps to smart home devices.
Users across the U.S. and UK reported widespread disruptions to platforms including Snapchat, Fortnite, Roblox, Duolingo, and even major banking apps like Lloyds and Halifax. Popular Amazon-owned services — Alexa, Ring, Prime Video, and Amazon.com— were also hit.
According to outage tracker DownDetector, issues began just after 8 a.m. BST, with more than 6,000 reports in the U.S. and another 1,600 in the UK shortly after.
‘Half the Internet’ offline
AWS, Amazon’s powerful cloud-computing arm, hosts the infrastructure behind thousands of major websites and apps. When it falters, the impact is felt everywhere — and today, that impact was colossal.
Early reports point to problems at AWS’s North Virginia (us-east-1) data center — one of the internet’s most critical hubs. Roughly three-quarters of outage reports originated from that region.
Cyberattack or internal error?
While some feared a cyberattack, security experts say it’s too early to tell.
“Right now, there’s no evidence of hacking or data breaches,” said Jake Moore, cybersecurity advisor at ESET. “It looks like an internal technical fault, but until AWS releases a full post-incident report, we can’t completely rule out a cyberattack.”
AWS confirmed an “operational issue” on its Health Dashboard, saying engineers were “actively working on mitigation and investigating the root cause.”
Users vent as smart homes go dark
The outage sparked frustration — and a few jokes — online as users turned to X (formerly Twitter) to confirm they weren’t alone.
“My Ring doorbell and cameras have been down for 13 hours,” one user complained.
Another added: “Alexa’s down — can’t turn on the lights at home. I’m literally sitting in the dark.”
One post summed it up with humor: “Me coming to Twitter to check if it’s just me or if Snapchat’s broken for everyone,” paired with a meme GIF.
Ripple effect across the web
The domino effect was immediate. With AWS powering roughly 30 percent of the global cloud market, its outage knocked out everything from PlayStation and Xbox networks to GOV.UK, the British government’s portal for passports, taxes, and visas.
“This looks like a cascading failure,” said Moore. “When one system slows down, others start to fail. It’s a reminder of how dependent we are on a few cloud providers — and how little redundancy exists when things go wrong.”
Experts warn: one region shouldn’t hold this much power
According to Dr. Manny Niri, a cybersecurity lecturer at Oxford Brookes University, the disruption points to a deeper problem in cloud infrastructure planning.
“This doesn’t look like a small glitch,” he said. “It may involve a failure in a key part of the internet’s backbone — storage, networking, or compute systems.”
Dr. Niri urged companies to diversify: “Relying on a single AWS region is a major risk. Businesses need multiple backups, failover systems, and offline redundancy.”
Andy Aitken, CEO of Honest Mobile, echoed the warning: “This is a clear reminder of how fragile the web really is. A single provider glitch can ripple across the world. Thankfully, they usually recover fast — but today shows how dependent we’ve all become.”
Apps and Services Affected Include:
Snapchat • Amazon • Ring • Roblox • Lloyds Bank • Halifax • GOV.UK • Duolingo • PlayStation Network • Xbox Network • Zoom • Wordle • Coinbase • Slack • Trello • MyFitnessPal • Fortnite • Alexa • Prime Video • IMDb • Tidal • Eventbrite • HMRC • Signal • and many more.
As of late morning, Amazon engineers continued working to restore full service. The cause remains unclear — but whether human error, system failure, or cyberattack, today’s outage has made one thing clear: the internet is only as strong as the cloud that holds it up. Photo by Biodin, Wikimedia commons.