Facebook and Instagram down: Social media platform crashes leaving billions locked out of their accounts
Facebook went down for the second time in a week tonight, leaving millions of users locked out of their accounts on the social media platform.
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Users across the worlds were greeted with the message "Sorry, something went wrong" when trying to log onto the social media platform via desktop computers while those using mobile apps saw a network error.
Facebook, which claims to have around 1.2bn monthly users, crashed shortly after 8pm UK time and remained inaccessible for around 45 minutes.
The hashtag #facebookdown started trending on Twitter as social media hungry users took to an alternative platform to complain of the issue.
A Facebook spokesperson said:
We’re currently restoring Facebook services that people had trouble accessing earlier today due to a configuration issue. We’re working to bring things back to normal for everyone. We apologize to those who have been inconvenienced.
This is the second time in a week the site has crashed, after it went down briefly for some users on Thursday.
Instagram also appeared to appeared to be inaccessible to many users voicing their frustrations on Twitter.