Content, CSPs

Zoom Explains Service Outage; Blames Application Bug

Zoom Video Communications ($ZM) has apologized for a partial outage on August 24, and blamed the 3.5 hour service service disruption on an application-level bug.

Velchamy Sankarlingam, president, product and engineering, Zoom Video Communications
Velchamy Sankarlingam, president, product and engineering, Zoom Video Communications

The outage started at 4:56 a.m. PDT on August 24 and was largely fixed by 8:26 a.m. PDT that same day, according to an evening email to customers from Velchamy Sankarlingam, president of product and engineering.

The issue triggered a partial disruption of Zoom Meeting, Webinar and website services. "We have determined that the cause of this service disruption was related to an application-level bug in our system, which resulted in a web login issue for customers," Sankarlingam wrote in the email.

The outage surfaced at a key time for many customers -- particularly colleges and schools that are kicking off the fall semester with expanded online learning services amid the coronavirus pandemic.

Meanwhile, Zoom continues to diversify and expand its video conferencing services worldwide. The latest steps include Zoom Phone service pushing into new markets, and Zoom hardware as a service (HaaS) options designed as subscription services.

Joe Panettieri

Joe Panettieri is co-founder & editorial director of MSSP Alert and ChannelE2E, the two leading news & analysis sites for managed service providers in the cybersecurity market.