According to Downdetector, reports of outages started in the UK, followed by Canada, Germany, Italy and France. The tracker said the vast majority of people affected by the outage were using the Twitter website, not the app.
Twitter did not immediately respond to a request for comment. In a sign that the worst is over, reports of outages dropped sharply a few hours after the problems began, according to trackers.
Observers and analysts have feared a massive global blackout since billionaire Elon Musk took over the company. In October, shortly before the acquisition, The Washington Post reported on Musk’s internal money-saving plans, which included slashing the data centers that keep the website running.
Since taking over, Musk has fired thousands of employees, including engineers, and many more have resigned, leaving only a cadre of Twitter personnel.
Twitter operates three major data centers around the world. Musk ordered the closure of Sacramento’s largest data center for Christmas, sparking insider pain, according to a person familiar with the matter who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal matters.
In a group chat with current and former engineers on Wednesday, some speculated that the outage was caused by a buggy software update, the person said.
On Wednesday night, Musk tweeted that the service would work for him.