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Google Outage: Internet Traffic Plunges 40%

Posted by samzenpus on from the have-some-google dept.

cold fjord writes "Is 40% anything to worry about? Sky News reports, 'Worldwide internet traffic plunged by around 40% as Google services suffered a complete black-out, according to web analytics experts. The tech company said all of its services from Google Search to Gmail to YouTube to Google Drive went down for between one and five minutes last night. The reason for the outage is not yet known, and Google refused to provide any further information when contacted by Sky News Online. According to web analytics firm GoSquared, global internet traffic fell by around 40% during the black-out, reflecting Google's massive grip on the web. "That's huge," said GoSquared developer Simon Tabor. "As internet users, our reliance on Google.com being up is huge."'

11 of 352 comments (clear)

  1. Not surprising by tuo42 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I lost count of how many people and customers I know who no longer use the address bar to enter an URL, but Google. Open Browser, Google as start page, enter for example "slashdot.org", click the first hit.

    Many of them even access their own company website like this. Or their social networks etc. While I never understood why they do it (or use a browser which actually works this way like Chrome or Safari, where the URL bar also is the search field), this if course means a single point of failure. If they are not able to access google, they don't how to access the website they "search".

    And while I am of course not talking about technical adept people, most of them are no morons who are simply not able to comprehend the difference...it's just the way they access the internet...through google (so they think).

    1. Re:Not surprising by tuo42 · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Don't think so.

      Some of them have not only very high scientific degrees, but are also on the board of larger (>600 employees), successful companies.

      They might not have the computer knowledge you have, but I wouldn't be so ignorant to call anyone a moron because he is not savvy in one partical field or is simply not interested in becoming more savvy, as the way he operates the internet until know worked for him and he does not have the need or interest to expand his knowledge there.

      How many bright people drive cars without even knowing the simplest things about combustion engines and drivetrains? Are they all morons? There, that's our car analogy for this topic.

  2. NSA rerouting traffic by nbritton · · Score: 4, Interesting

    It was just the NSA patching in their new data center...

  3. Facebook by tuppe666 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Pro Tip: Rather than Googling 'Facebook' you could use a bookmark, or try www.facebook.com

    Facebook is definitely Googles main threat (when will they release their own search engine). Its why Google are throwing everything behind Google+. I have been astonished how Microsoft/Apple have been prepared to squander their respective advantages by not having a social network, preferring to support Facebook against Google.

  4. So. It has come to this. by martin-boundary · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Chinese hackers just have to hack Google, and 40% of the internet can be down on demand. The original visionaries at DARPA must be rolling in their grave...

  5. Google+ is growing by tuppe666 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Probably because they're not fools.

    Except Googe+ is growing, and even though it is in no way eclipsing Facebook. Yahoo was dominant in search; Apple was dominant in smartphones; Hotmail was dominant in internet mail. How is the fact that there is strong player in the market relevant, both Apple and Microsoft could benefit from having their own social network, and Facebook is a threat to both.

    1. Re:Google+ is growing by khallow · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Apple's would just be some kind of hybrid prison/sandpit.

      But do you get an official Hutt sendoff?

    2. Re:Google+ is growing by mcvos · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Facebook seems to revolve a lot around resharing vague funny images. G+ is more about real discussion. Resharing images does happen on occasion, but not to the point where it becomes tedious. In the early days of G+, there was such an image listing the most talked about person on Facebook, Twitter and Google+. They were some pop star, some other pop star, and Albert Einstein, respectively.

      Call it elitist if you like, but I vastly prefer the topics of discussion on G+ over those on Facebook.

  6. Not that big of a deal. by Jah-Wren+Ryel · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The short duration exaggerates the issue. If Google were to go away for a day or a week, most everyone would switch to some other service like Bing, etc. But when it goes down for just a few minutes people don't even have time to figure out that google is the problem itself rather than a hiccup in their internet connection. Most people will just hit reload a couple of times, curse, check their phone for text messages and by then everything has recovered and they quickly forget that there even was a problem.

    --
    When information is power, privacy is freedom.
  7. Re:40%? No. by petermgreen · · Score: 4, Interesting

    What is an internet exchange?

    It's a place where providers peer when they are not exchanging enough traffic to justify private peering. Exchange point connections are cheap compared to transit but expensive compared to private peering links. Traffic from major access providers to the likes of google is unlikely to go through an internet exchange because with that volume of traffic private peering is more economical.

    Which is not to say the 40% figure is true, it's just to say that traffic on an internet exchange is not a reprepsenative sample of internet traffic

    --
    note: i'm known as plugwash most places but i screwd up registering that here somehow in the past and now can't register
  8. I can explain it... by Lumpy · · Score: 1, Interesting

    Windows Server 2012 upgrades on all their servers...

    What? Windows is so good I am certain that Google runs windows.... The MS guys here cant be lying to me.

    --
    Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.