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Tom’s Guide
Tom’s Guide
Technology
Dave LeClair

Zoom is back after going down — live recap of outage and what went wrong

Zoom down.

Companies all over the world rely on Zoom for meetings, which is why it was such a big deal that the popular video calling platform was basically unusable around the world for most of Wednesday (April 16).

Just after 5 p.m. Eastern, Zoom posted an update to its status page that the "issue with multiple Zoom Services," which had been plaguing the service all day, has been dealt with.

The outage was blamed on "domain name resolution issues" and the outage reportedly lasted from 2:25 pm et and 4:12 et.

Here's the full statement:
On April 16, between 2:25 p.m. ET and 4:12 p.m. ET, the domain zoom.us was not available due to a server block by GoDaddy Registry. This block was the result of a communication error between Zoom’s domain registrar, Markmonitor, and GoDaddy Registry, which resulted in GoDaddy Registry mistakenly shutting down zoom.us domain.

Zoom, Markmonitor, and GoDaddy worked quickly to identify and remove the block, which restored service to the domain zoom.us. There was no product, security, or network failure at Zoom during the outage. GoDaddy and Markmonitor are working together to prevent this from happening again.

For now it looks like Zoom calls are working again. Scroll down for a look back at how it all went wrong.

Zoom outage live updates

The outage begins

(Image credit: Down Detector)

Zoom's outage reports have exploded on Down Detector in a very short time. With more than 67,000 reports, users around the world are hitting the outage reporting website to let everyone now they can't use Zoom.

Thousands of potentially important meetings are being missed due to the Zoom outage (and perhaps even more frivolous meetings). We'll continue to monitor the outage and keep you posted as anything happens.

Zoom status page

(Image credit: Zoom)

Zoom was quick to acknowledge the outage on its status page, which is a good sign that something is wrong. More often than not, we'll hear about an outage on Down Detector and the company follows up with its own reports later. Because Zoom is used for work, it makes sense for the company to be quick to report the outage.

Now, whether it's able to fix the outage quickly is another question and we will continue to monitor for any fixes.

You get a day off!

Zoom's outage could grind work to a stop for some companies that use the video conferencing software to get through their days. Thankfully, the best video conferencing software options are available to fill the gap.

However, as great as those other services are, it can be hard to get large companies to pivot off the software they're already using.

Zoom Meetings - partial outage

(Image credit: Zoom)

Zoom has updated its status page to reflect that meetings are dealing with a partial outage. This is the same status posted on the web portal and it's clearly the one that's causing users to be unable to get on and do their meetings.

Still investigating...

(Image credit: Shutterstock)

"We are investigating domain name resolution issues on the zoom.us domain that is affecting multiple services. Regular updates will be provided," reads the Zoom status page.

This was posted about 25 minutes ago, so hopefully we will hear something more shortly. We're hoping remote workers worldwide can access their video conferencing app.

Zoom.us is the issue

(Image credit: Shutterstock)

I actually tried to email Zoom to find out more about what's happening with the service to keep you all updated, and the email addresses with Zoom.us are being sent back. Whether I tried to reach the general customer service email address or a press contact, I couldn't get an email to go through.

A Zoom status update

Zoom posted an update on its outage status page. Unfortunately, the update didn't actually tell us anything new, other than informing us that the company is still investigating the issue.

"We continue to investigate the domain name resolution issues on the zoom.us domain that is affecting multiple services. More updates to follow," reads the status page.

Server hold?

(Image credit: GoDaddy)

Interestingly, Zoom.us is listed under "Server Hold" status on GoDaddy. An anonymous tipster emailed me, pointing out the interesting status listed on the WHOIS search.

This could be why anything going through that domain isn't working now. Perhaps Zoom and GoDaddy will sort that out quickly and get things back to working properly soon.

Everything impacted by Zoom outage

Zoom's status page has some fine print that explains which services are affected by the Zoom.us issues:

"This incident affects: Zoom Meetings (Zoom Meetings), Zoom Phone - Global (Web Portal (Admin/Users/Provisioning/Dashboard & Reporting)), Zoom Contact Center - Global (Web Portal (Admin/Users/Provisioning)), and Zoom Website (Web Portal)."

DDoS?

Some users on X say that the hacker group DarkStorm launched a DDoS on Zoom. The group said "all zoom servers taken down" on X.

I can't personally confirm this is true, as it could be a group trying to stake a claim in an unrelated outage, but it's definitely something to keep an eye on.

Bad Gateway

(Image credit: Cloudflare)

If you try to go directly to Zoom.us, you'll be greeted with a big Bad Gateway Cloudflare error.

Zoom coming back

(Image credit: Zoom)

Zoom posted another update on its status page and this time, it's good news. Here's what the company posted on its website regarding the current outage situation:

"Services are starting to recover. If you are still unable to connect please flush your DNS cache and reattempt and you should be able to connect," reads the latest update.

Maybe it's not?

(Image credit: Zoom)

After getting the screenshot of Zoom saying services are recovering, the company appears to have deleted that and updated the status page with a "We continue to investigate the domain name resolution issues on the zoom.us domain that is affecting multiple services. More updates to follow" message.

All quiet right now, but reports are dropping

(Image credit: Down Detector)

Zoom hasn't posted any new updates on its status page. Reports on Down Detector have started dropping precipitously, though. This is usually a sign that things are getting ready to come back to normal for Zoom.

As always, we'll continue to monitor the situation with the latest news and updates so you can keep an eye on what's happening with Zoom and its massive outage.

Zoom finally posts on X

Zoom took to X to post about the outage after a long time. The company said, "We are experiencing an outage that is impacting some users, but a restore is underway."

While it's nothing new, it's at least nice for the company to acknowledge the outage outside of those who are checking its status page.

Yep, still down

(Image credit: Down Detector)

Zoom is still down, but things are looking a lot rosier now than they were earlier today.

I'm seeing reports that Zoom is down on Down Detector as well, but they're a tenth of the spike we saw this morning. Still, if you have any meetings coming up on your calendar it'd probably be wise to find an alternate platform.

Zoom is back, baby

(Image credit: Zoom)

Like it or not, it looks like Zoom is back and running just fine.

After watching outage reports on Down Detector steadily dwindle for the past hour, I just saw Zoom post an update to X claiming that service is back in business.

The company has also posted guidelines for how to flush your DNS cache to its support page, so give that a shot if you're still having issues with your Zoom calls today.

Zoom is still going strong

(Image credit: Shutterstock)

After the complete outage yesterday, Zoom is back in action and there are no signs of it crashing again (thankfully).

Zoom was down for a fair few hours during the outage, and that affected quite a few workers who rely on it for video calls and online meetings. That's not a good look for Zoom, so it promptly got to work fixing the issue. Now, everything is working as usual.

As of today, Zoom hasn't made any further updates on any new outages, so back to your regularly scheduled video calls!

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