Key Takeaways
- WhatsApp experienced a temporary outage, preventing users from sending or receiving messages.
- Meta acknowledged the glitch and fixed the problem within a few hours. This was WhatsApp’s first major outage in four years, with the last one having occurred in 2021.
- In the same week, Instagram users reported seeing violent and disturbing content due to an algorithm malfunction. Even accounts with sensitive content filters were affected, raising concerns about Meta’s content moderation policies.
On Friday afternoon, WhatsApp briefly glitched, and users were unable to send or load their messages.
Within a matter of a few minutes, there were thousands of reports regarding WhatsApp being down on Downdetector, the tracker website. Several users took to X, too, to complain about being unable to send messages or use the app entirely.
While a vast majority of the issues were reported from the UK initially, the outage seems to have been a global experience. That’s because there were more than 8,000 problems logged in the US in a matter of an hour.
Besides WhatsApp, there were also reports about Facebook Messenger having issues, but the reports in this case were far fewer than those about WhatsApp.
Read more: WhatsApp users targeted by Paragon solutions
Meta took care of this issue quickly, and the platform was back up and working in a matter of a few hours. A Meta spokesperson acknowledged the issues and said that everything has now been fixed.
It’s worth noting that a downtime on WhatsApp has resurfaced after four long years, with the last outage being a severe 7-hour one across all Meta platforms. It cost the tech company more than $100 million in revenue.
Meta Parody of Glitches: Instagram Insensitive Content Glitch
WhatsApp downtime isn’t the only thing that went wrong in the Meta ecosystem this week. Just a couple of days ago, Meta’s Instagram suddenly started coughing up gross, violent content for no apparent reason.
Even the users who had put a filter on sensitive content were shown reels that had extreme violence or crime involved in them. It seemed to be an algorithm glitch, but it was surely a very concerning one. Unprecedented, too.
Good or not, most people open Instagram first thing in the morning. Imagine opening the app and seeing a guy being smashed across his head with a giant rod. Or getting shot at by a terrorist. Certainly a disturbing sight, right? This is what millions of users reported experiencing. Even worse, users less than 18 years old, too, came across such content.
This glitch came soon after Instagram revised its policies to give users more freedom on what they want to see. Instagram is known for its stringent content policies and strong regulation systems, but few people consider it a way of content moderation.
Keeping those remarks in mind, Instagram changed its content policy and attempted to censor only content that promotes illegal activities. But that clearly doesn’t seem to be working efficiently enough.
Interestingly, this isn’t the first time that a breakout of harmful content has been experienced by the users, with a similar issue happening around the pandemic.
Meta apologized for the inconvenience and explained that the glitch happened due to some technical issue. The tech giant is working to make sure that the platform is safe for all users, especially since now it has one of the biggest opportunities to expand amidst TikTok’s uncertainty in the US.
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Vlad is Techreport’s in-house Executive Editor. With over a decade of experience in tech content, he’s passionate about computer hardware, an advocate of online privacy, and strongly believes in the open-source, scarce-money nature of cryptocurrency. Read more
When he’s not working, he’s traveling with his partner and their cat, learning Python, or reading good books. He never owned a PC he did not build. Read less
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