For several hours now, multiple major financial services or apps have been in the middle of a server outage in the US. What seems to have started on the Square platform, is now affecting other services.
The situation caught thousands of users off guard who unexpectedly saw their payments fail or not be completed due processing issues on platforms such as Cash App, Venmo, Zelle or even Apple Pay.
Major financial services suffer serious outage in US
Social platforms like X (Twitter) have been abuzz all day with reports from users frustrated at being unable to make transactions or access their money across multiple services.
As mentioned, it all seems to have started with the Square POS platform nation-wide outage. There are platform-dependent services (such as Apple Pay or Cash App), so it’s no surprise to see them go down too.
However, the situation became more complicated when the financial services outage also reached non-Square-related services. Among these we can name Zelle or Venmo.
So, while the reason behind the issues on Square-related services is known, the root of the issue on non-dependent platforms is currently unclear.
Cyber attack or hack ruled out for Square-related services
When widespread and unexplained outages like this happen, one of the first things users fear is a hack or cyber attack. However, Square’s support team ruled out this possibility for the peace of mind of its users.
We can assure you Square has not been hacked. We are experiencing a data center disruption, affecting some Square services.
Source
But, there is still no official word regarding services not related to Square. Meanwhile, the company simply claims that the outage is due to an issue with one data center.
We appreciate your continued patience as we continue to investigate a disruption with one of our Data Centers. (Source)
It’s noteworthy that while some affected services are still down, others are slowly recovering. The main question on everyone’s minds is what caused so many financial services to suffer an outage at the same time?
Sadly, there is still no official information on what could have been the root of this big ongoing financial services outage.
We’ll monitor the situation to update this story once new relevant developments emerge.
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