AWS Outage: What Amazon Said After Major Website Disruptions

Amazon Web Services (AWS) says most of its systems are back online after a significant outage on Monday, October 20, 2025, took down major websites and apps across the globe. The disruption, which began shortly after 3 a.m. Eastern Time, lasted for more than two hours and affected banking services, entertainment platforms, government sites, and popular apps.

By 5:27 a.m. ET, Amazon confirmed that most services had resumed normal operation, though it was still processing a “backlog of queued requests.” The company continued to update customers throughout the morning, stating that recovery was progressing and some requests might be throttled as systems stabilized.

Amazon Explains Cause of AWS Outage

Amazon said its initial investigation pointed to an internal traffic-balancing system failure in its “us-east-1” region in Northern Virginia — home to one of its largest data centers. This malfunction disrupted how traffic was distributed across the network, causing services that depend on AWS to go offline.

The outage impacted a wide range of platforms and services, including WhatsApp, Coinbase, Venmo, Signal, McDonald’s app, Ring doorbells, Roblox, Fortnite, and many others. Government services in the UK, major banks like Lloyd’s and Bank of Scotland, and communication tools like Slack and Zoom were also affected.

According to outage tracker DownDetector, there were over eight million reports of disruptions by 9:45 a.m. ET, mainly from users in the United States and the United Kingdom. Despite the scale of the incident, Amazon’s share price remained largely unchanged in premarket trading, indicating that investors were not alarmed by the event.

This outage is another reminder of the internet’s reliance on a few major cloud providers. Experts highlighted that when a platform like AWS — which powers streaming services, web applications, and massive data storage — experiences issues, the ripple effects can be felt worldwide.

Experts Warn About Over-Reliance on Few Cloud Providers

Harry Halpin, CEO of NymVPN, noted that even governments and militaries rely on services like AWS. He received messages from Ukrainian soldiers affected by the outage, illustrating the potential risks when entire nations depend on a handful of U.S.-based providers. “It’s an exceedingly dangerous situation,” Halpin said. “Everyone takes it for normal, but it’s not.”

Others, like Corinne Cath-Speth of Article 19, warned that democratic institutions and free speech could be at risk if essential communication platforms rely too heavily on a small number of cloud providers. She called for urgent diversification in the cloud computing sector.

Rebecca Wright, a computer science professor at Barnard College, acknowledged the trade-offs but argued that outsourcing to major providers still offers strong security and expertise for smaller companies. Meanwhile, Mehdi Daoudi of Catchpoint noted a recent shift among some firms returning to private infrastructure due to rising cloud costs.

The outage also reignited calls in Europe for greater digital sovereignty. Alexandra Geese, a member of the European Parliament, said the incident showed why Europe must host critical data and infrastructure within its jurisdiction. “It’s a stark reminder that Europe’s digital sovereignty is not an abstract concept, but a matter of security and resilience,” she said.

As AWS services return to normal, Amazon says it will continue to monitor the situation and address lingering delays. The outage has once again exposed the vulnerabilities of global infrastructure that relies heavily on just a few cloud providers.

FYI (keeping you in the loop)-

Q1: What caused the AWS outage?

Amazon said the issue was linked to an internal traffic-balancing system in its Northern Virginia data center region, which disrupted how network traffic was handled.

Q2: Which services were affected by the AWS outage?

Popular platforms like WhatsApp, Venmo, Coinbase, Snapchat, Slack, Fortnite, and even government websites were affected, along with several major banks and apps.

Q3: How long did the AWS outage last?

The disruption began shortly after 3 a.m. ET and lasted for over two hours, with most services recovering by around 5:30 a.m. ET, though some delays persisted.

Q4: How did Amazon respond to the outage?

Amazon provided regular updates and confirmed that most services were back online by early morning. It continues to work on clearing backlogged requests and stabilizing performance.

Q5: What does this mean for future cloud reliability?

Experts say the outage highlights risks of over-reliance on a few cloud providers. There are growing calls for diversification and more regional cloud infrastructure.