The connectivity failure started Monday morning, leading to Microsoft confirming the outage on Twitter and its own blog. Skype was out for hours on Monday and it seems the problem is persistent today. There are a range of problems being reported, all stemming from downed connections. Some users report they lose connectivity to the service, while others say they cannot send or receive messages. Other reports suggest myriad other problems. Microsoft used its Support Twitter account to reconfirm it is dealing with a “global incident”.
— Skype Support (@SkypeSupport) June 20, 2017 The latest update on the Heartbeat page states there are ongoing issues: “We’re seeing improvements and users also signal us they can use Skype. However, there are still users that may experience the issue – we’re working on that” It is unclear what has caused the problem. Microsoft said Monday evening the issue was fixed, but that is clearly not the case today. The most likely scenario is a glitch or bug in the system. Other mooted reasons are a cyberattack. Indeed, some outlets are already claiming Skype has been subjected to a DDoS attack. Cybercriminals on Twitter are claiming to have caused the crash and say they will target game streaming service Steam next. DownDetector’s outage map shows that users in the UK and Europe were mostly affected. While users from other regions don’t seem to be having problems, Microsoft is saying it is a global problem.
Skype Update
While an attack is being mooted, it is also worth remembering that Microsoft recently launched a significant update for Skype. The biggest update in a decade saw the company radically overhaul the communications service. Skype got a modern design and plenty of new features that aim to help it compete with rivals like SnapChat.
