AWS data center failure causes multiple major sites to go down

One of the most frequently used cloud services available is Amazon Web Services (AWS), which hosts some of the world’s most popular websites. Netflix, Airbnb and Vine all utilize Amazon’s servers. Handling the vast volume of data running through these sites is a considerable feat, and while AWS may typically be able to manage the demand, it failed on Aug. 25 for a number of major sites, according to BBC News.

The problems were traced to a data centre in northern Virginia that was struggling to keep up with demand. The problems for Americans began about 16:00 Eastern time (21:00 GMT) and continued for 59 minutes. During this time access to the web services was intermittent with many people reporting that login pages were hard to reach or pages were taking a long time to update.

On the status page for its web services, Amazon said it was investigating a series of problems at the Virginia data centre. The problems hit databases, software that spreads queries across servers as well as the code controlling the core computers underlying the whole service.

After the problems were resolved, Amazon said the glitch was caused by the “partial failure of a networking device” but added no further details.

References:  http://copperegg.com/aws-data-center-failure-causes-multiple-major-sites-to-go-down/

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-23839901

http://status.aws.amazon.com/