Instagram, WhatsApp, Facebook have outages worldwide

Call it a perfect social media-free storm.

Facebook’s three social platforms — Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp — all experienced outages on Wednesday morning. 

According to Down Detector, there were problems around the world. Outages were concentrated in the eastern United States, and parts of Europe and South America.

The trouble seems to have started around 7am E.T. and persisted into the morning. 

Users had trouble posting stories and posts on Facebook and Instagram, and viewing media content on all three platforms.

Instagram went down for multiple hours just weeks prior, which caused some on social media to complain about the seemingly frequent problems.

Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp may be distinct social networks, but they’re sharing more and more behind-the-scenes architecture these days. Facebook is integrating the technology that runs the messaging systems of all three. And Facebook is reportedly exerting more managerial control over the other platforms. 

We can’t say whether that’s affecting the outage, but it’s no coincidence they’re all part of the same mothership. Mashable has contacted Facebook to learn more about the outages, and will update this story when we learn more.