Meta Platforms—Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp suffered 6-hour global outage affecting 3.5 billion users
On October 4, 2021, all Meta services including Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Messenger went offline for approximately 6 hours due to a faulty BGP configuration change during routine maintenance. The outage affected an estimated 3.5 billion users worldwide, disrupted businesses dependent on the platforms, and caused an estimated $100 million in lost advertising revenue. WhatsApp's outage was particularly impactful in developing countries where it serves as critical communication infrastructure.
Scoring Impact
| Topic | Direction | Relevance | Contribution |
|---|---|---|---|
| Infrastructure Accountability | -against | primary | -1.00 |
| Overall incident score = | -0.590 | ||
Score = avg(topic contributions) × significance (critical ×2) × confidence (0.59)× agency (negligent ×0.5)
Evidence (1 signal)
Wikipedia documents Meta's October 2021 six-hour global outage affecting 3.5 billion users
The 2021 Facebook outage occurred on October 4, 2021. All Meta services including Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Messenger went offline for approximately 6 hours due to a faulty BGP configuration change. Over 10.6 million users reported problems worldwide.