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Google said it has fixed an issue that led to global outages in its online services, including Gmail, Google Docs and Meet.
When the services of one of the biggest tech companies suddenly stop working or are taking a lot longer than normal to load, the world tends to notice. Earlier today (20 August), reports emerged that many Google products were experiencing outages and disruptions.
This included Gmail users being unable to attach files to emails across both personal accounts and businesses on G Suite accounts, or in some cases having emails failing to send at all.
On its page dedicated to charting the status of its various products, Google said the full list of problems included: “Gmail sending issues, Meet recording issues, creating files issues in Drive, CSV user upload issues in Admin Console, posting message issues in Google Chat, sites adding new pages issues, Keep issues, voicemail issues.”
At 12.10pm Irish time, a Google statement said that issues with Gmail should be resolved. The company apologised for the inconvenience and thanked users for their patience. Similar updates were given for Google Sheets, Docs, Drive, Slides, Chat, Meet, Keep and Voice.
Internet during Covid-19
With many now working from home around the world as a result of Covid-19, major internet service outages have received considerable attention. In March, Microsoft Teams experienced an outage across Europe not long after it was made available to companies for free temporarily in an effort to help during the outbreak.
Service providers have experienced significant strain on their networks as a result of the pandemic. Network monitoring company ThousandEyes previously released a real-time internet outage map highlighting the strain being placed on networks across the world.
The real-time map is a basic visualisation of global internet health, using billions of measurements to detect when traffic flows are disrupted within internet service providers, public cloud networks and other service providers.
