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Google users hit by mail blackout | Google users hit by mail blackout |
(about 2 hours later) | |
Google has apologised for the outage that hit business and consumer users of its popular e-mail service. | |
The GMail service went offline at 0930 GMT and, Google claims, was unavailable to all for "approximately two and a half hours". | |
But anecdotal evidence suggests it was out of action for many users for about four hours - one of the longest downtimes ever suffered by Google. | |
More than 113 million people use Google mail worldwide, according to comScore. | More than 113 million people use Google mail worldwide, according to comScore. |
In a statement posted on its official Google blog it said: "We're really sorry about this, and we did do everything to restore access as soon as we could.". | |
It said its engineers were still investigating the "root cause" of the problem. | |
"We know how important GMail is to our users so we take this very seriously," it added. | "We know how important GMail is to our users so we take this very seriously," it added. |
It said that those getting back into their e-mail may have to fill in a captcha form that asks people to decipher and re-type some scrambled letters before getting access to messages. | |
According to comScore, Google has the world's third most popular web mail service behind Hotmail with 283 million users and Yahoo with 274 million e-mail users. | According to comScore, Google has the world's third most popular web mail service behind Hotmail with 283 million users and Yahoo with 274 million e-mail users. |
Professional suite | Professional suite |
More than a million business around the world use Google's professional suite of applications, including e-mail. Google itself relies on the service and press spokespeople for the firm were unable to e-mail journalists with statements regarding the problem. | More than a million business around the world use Google's professional suite of applications, including e-mail. Google itself relies on the service and press spokespeople for the firm were unable to e-mail journalists with statements regarding the problem. |
Professional users are covered by a service level agreement that promises to be 99.9% operational in any calendar month. | Professional users are covered by a service level agreement that promises to be 99.9% operational in any calendar month. |
The "premier edition" of the Apps service costs $50 (£34) per user for a year. | The "premier edition" of the Apps service costs $50 (£34) per user for a year. |
According to Google, its e-mail service suffered an average of 10 to 15 minutes of downtime per month in 2008. | According to Google, its e-mail service suffered an average of 10 to 15 minutes of downtime per month in 2008. |
The last outage of note was in August 2008 when users were unable to use Google Mail for "a couple of hours". | The last outage of note was in August 2008 when users were unable to use Google Mail for "a couple of hours". |
After the incident Todd Jackson, product manager for Google Mail, said in a blog post: "We're conducting a full review of what went wrong and moving quickly to update our internal systems and procedures accordingly." | After the incident Todd Jackson, product manager for Google Mail, said in a blog post: "We're conducting a full review of what went wrong and moving quickly to update our internal systems and procedures accordingly." |
On its support page for Google Mail, the firm said "A number of users have had difficulty accessing GMail today. | On its support page for Google Mail, the firm said "A number of users have had difficulty accessing GMail today. |
"The majority are now able to access their e-mail accounts again and we're hoping to have service restored for the remainder very soon." | "The majority are now able to access their e-mail accounts again and we're hoping to have service restored for the remainder very soon." |