Tech
Dozens of websites are down right now including some banks and airlines
The problem stems from problems with a company called Akamai's DNS service.
If you’re having a hard time checking in for a flight online, logging into your internet banking, or trying to book an Airbnb, you’re not alone: A massive number of websites are down or experiencing technical difficulties with parts of their services due to a problem at a cloud services company called Akamai.
The company posted the following statement on its website explaining it’s aware of the issue and is trying to resolve it:
We are aware of an emerging issue with the Edge DNS service. We are actively investigating the issue. If you have questions or are experiencing impact due to this issue, please contact Akamai Technical Support. In the interest of time, we are providing you the most current information available, which is subject to changes, corrections, and updates.
A look at the website Downdetector shows that some of the services affected include: AT&T, Chase, Delta, Steam, UPS, Airbnb, Delta, Discover, LastPass, PNC, Fidelity, Salesforce, Ally, PlayStation Network, Cloudflare, Home Depot, FedEx, Southwest Airlines, and dozens more.
Check-in in person — At the time of writing, Delta is displaying its own note about the problem at the top of its homepage, which loads fine, but may not let you check-in:
WE’RE ON IT: We are currently working to resolve a technology issue that is impacting many global websites including delta.com and the Fly Delta App. You can continue to check in for flights at this time at the airport. Thank you for your patience and we apologize for the inconvenience as we work with our service provider quickly to resolve the issue.
Another Fastly — Last month a similar problem at a cloud services company called Fastly temporarily took down Reddit, Amazon, and Twitch. Whenever these massive outages happen we’re reminded just how tenuous the digital services we rely on are sometimes. Growing consolidation in the sector means a shrinking number of providers of the services that underpin the internet, which means when something does go wrong (as it inevitably will from time to time) the effects can be enormous.
UPDATE (1:15 p.m. ET): Akamai says all of it’s systems are operational again on its system status page.
