Meta blames mass outage on 'technical issue' but won't say what caused issues after hundreds of thousands report not being able to use Facebook, Instagram and Messenger

Meta revealed the massive outage that hit Facebook, Instagram and Messenger was caused by ‘technical issues’ - but has not shared exactly what the 'issues' are.

The Mark Zuckerberg-owned platforms were down for at least two and a half hours on Tuesday, leaving hundreds of thousands of users unable to access their accounts.

A Facebook insider told DailyMail.com that their internal systems were not working at the time Meta’s service dashboard showed ‘Major disruptions’ for many of its services.

An internal issue would knock out connections - similar to what happened in 2021 when all of Meta’s platforms were down for seven hours.

Meta revealed the massive outage that hit Facebook, Instagram and Messenger was caused by ‘technical issues’ - but has not shared exactly what the 'issues' are

Andy Stone, Meta’s communication director, posted on X about 1.5 hours after users reported issues: ‘Earlier today, a technical issue caused people to have difficulty accessing some of our services. We resolved the issue as quickly as possible for everyone who was impacted, and we apologize for any inconvenience.’

However, the post attracted many users who pleaded for an explanation of what was behind the issues.

Stone has not yet replied to any comments.

While it is not clear what internal tools may have triggered the outage, such technologies are the backbone of organizations.

They are internally-facing software developed and utilized within an organization to streamline processes, automate repetitive tasks and provide employees with the information they need to make informed decisions.

Andy Stone, Meta’s communication director, posted on X about 1.5 hours after users reported issues

A small mistake, such as adding the wrong code or command, could have knocked out Facebook, Instagram and Messenger.

That is what triggered the seven-hour-long outage in 2021, which led to Zuckerberg losing around $7 billion amid the carnage.

'Our engineering teams have learned that configuration changes on the backbone routers that coordinate network traffic between our data centers caused issues that interrupted this communication,' Facebook shared regarding the 2021 issues.

'This disruption to network traffic had a cascading effect on the way our data centers communicate, bringing our services to a halt.'

DownDetector, which monitors online outages, showed hundreds of thousands in the US alone had problems with Facebook and tens of thousands reported the same with Instagram, while Messenger had a few thousand issue reports

Along with the US, the outage reached the UK, parts of Europe, China, Australia and Mexico – leading to Meta's stock price falling

However, Meta has yet to tell the world what caused today's outage.

The issues appeared around 10:20am ET (3:20pm GMT) and impacted both apps and websites – although Meta's WhatsApp was unaffected. 

Angry users found themselves suddenly booted out of their accounts, making them think they'd been hacked and their personal details stolen. 

Meanwhile, the News Feed on Instagram started showing an error message. 

The majority of issue reports cited problems with the apps – 72 percent for Facebook, 64 percent for Instagram and Messenger is at 50 percent. 

DownDetector, which monitors online outages, showed hundreds of thousands in the US alone had problems with Facebook and tens of thousands reported the same with Instagram, while Messenger had a few thousand issue reports. 

Along with the US, the outage reached the UK, parts of Europe, China, Australia and Mexico – leading to Meta's stock price falling.

Users flooded to X (Twitter) to complain about the outage and share memes, to the delight of owner Elon Musk

Some people experiencing issues initially thought their accounts may have been hacked, but there are more than 80,000 posts on X about Facebook and Instagram being down

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Users flooded to X (Twitter) to complain about the outage and share memes, to the delight of owner Elon Musk.

Some people experiencing issues initially thought their accounts may have been hacked, but there are more than 80,000 posts on X about Facebook and Instagram being down.

Musk responded to Meta's outage with a post on X: 'If you’re reading this post, it’s because our servers are working.'

DailyMail.com also found that two-factor authentication (2FA) – which sends an SMS message with a code to a user's phone for login – was not working.

While the Facebook insider told DailyMail.com the issued stemmed from internal tools, the public has shared their speculations on X.

Some suggested that the outage is a 'cyberattack' as it is happening on Super Tuesday, which is when several states are set to hold presidential primaries.

Jake Moore, tech expert and security advisor at ESET, said a cyberattack is unlikely but not impossible.

'Facebook has a history of going down but this could be for a long list of reasons,' he told MailOnline.

'Although highly unlikely to be a cyber attack it can never be fully ruled out but it is far more likely to be yet another internal network problem.'

Kerri Lisenbigler, editor at TheRevOpsTeam, said the outage was an 'annoyance' but likely 'nothing too serious'.

'It's not the first time this has happened and won't be the last,' she told MailOnline.

'Large platforms such as Facebook and Instagram (and now Threads) manage an enormous amount of traffic and data every single hour of the day.

'This means a minor glitch or human server room error can easily snowball into an outage affecting millions of users.

'These things are only really a cause for concern should the teams at Meta not manage to get things back online within a few hours, that is when people will start speculating about the possibility of a cyberattack.'