Skype ‘working on a fix’ as communication service faces worldwide outage [Update]

Update: Skype is back up.

Just a day after Amazon Web Services issues forced popular internet platforms like Netflix, Product Hunt, Medium, SocialFlow and Buffer to go offline, Microsoft’s popular voice and video chat service Skype has gone down as well.

Although, Skype Support has tweeted that it’s “aware of an issue affecting Skype status”, the problem seems to be affecting most of the service’s features:

We are aware of an issue affecting Skype status at the moment, and are working on a quick fix: http://t.co/ymSzmrgEX0 pic.twitter.com/8LoqqL0hh7

— Skype Support (@SkypeSupport) September 21, 2015

It appears that people from around the world using the Skype app are unable to access their accounts, change status updates or make Skype calls.

In a blog, the Redmond-based company issued a statement saying that while Skype is “working on the issue”, users can still use Skype for Web in the interim.

“Some of you may experience problems with Skype presence and may not see online. We have detected an issue with the status settings of Skype,” Leonas Sendrauskas, a Skype engineer wrote.

He added that affected users “will not be able to change their status, their contacts will all show as offline and they will be unable to start Skype calls to them.” Instant messages, however, are still being delivered as usual.

Skype has an estimated 4.9 million daily active users (and more than 300-million monthly active users). As the internet company has not yet made an official statement on the matter, it’s unclear how many of its users are being affected. According to Twitter and Reddit users, the fact that complaints are coming from a host of countries suggests that the disruption is worldwide and likely global.

Read more: Apple’s App Store suffers major security rupture, over 30 infected apps found

As suggested in online forums, the following countries have so far experienced Skype down-time: Russia, Spain, Mexico, US, the UK, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Afghanistan, China, Sweden, South Africa, Finland, Australia, and more.

There appears to be a widespread @Skype outage. Our accounts have all gone offline or cannot log in. #VOAalert pic.twitter.com/s9iK1xvqX2

— Steve Herman (@W7VOA) September 21, 2015

“We’re working on a fix for this issue and hope to have an update for you soon. Please accept our apologies for any inconvenience caused while we get this resolved,” Sendrauskas added.

This news comes on the same day when Microsoft has announced a Skype plugin for its latest Edge browser.