X (Twitter) Bugs and Outage Updates

X Platform Experiencing Widespread Disruptions

Numerous X users, including this journalist, have reported difficulties with the platform’s core functions for more than a day. Issues include messages failing to load, timelines not refreshing, and the necessity of multiple page reloads to view specific posts.

According to Downdetector, a platform that relies on user-submitted reports to track website outages, the problems began on Thursday afternoon. Starting at 2:12 p.m. Eastern Time, thousands of users detailed a range of problems, from login failures to the disappearance of direct messages.

Official Acknowledgement of the Issue

X’s official Engineering account publicly recognized the degraded service on Thursday. They attributed the problems to an outage affecting a data center.

“X is aware that some users are currently encountering performance issues on the platform,” the account stated. “A data center outage is being addressed by our team, who are actively working towards a resolution.”

Possible Cause: Data Center Fire

Reports from Wired indicate a fire occurred on Thursday at a data center leased by X, located near Portland, Oregon. The connection between this incident and the current outages remains unconfirmed.

History of Service Disruptions

The last significant service interruption for X occurred in March. At that time, users globally were unexpectedly disconnected from the social network and faced challenges accessing feeds, sending messages, and interacting with content. Elon Musk, without providing supporting evidence, attributed this disruption to a cyberattack.

Prior to the March incident, X experienced substantial connectivity problems in December 2022 and July 2023. More recently, in May, many users observed their X timelines temporarily ceasing to update.

Workforce Reduction and Engineering Capacity

Following Elon Musk’s acquisition of X, previously known as Twitter, for $44 billion in 2022, a significant reduction in the company’s workforce was implemented. Approximately 80% of employees were laid off, decreasing the staff from 7,500 to 1,300.

By January 2023, X employed only 550 full-time engineers, as reported by CNBC. Further layoffs impacted the company in November 2024, with the engineering department being particularly affected.

Security Concerns

Since the acquisition, X has reportedly experienced security lapses, including misconfigured servers that potentially increased the platform’s vulnerability to denial of service attacks.