Amazon's Alexa down for thousands of users, AWS probes issues with signup

Amazon.com's voice assistant Alexa was down for thousands of users on Sunday, with many taking to social media to flag the issue. Users also reported issues accessing Amazon's mobile app and accessing Amazon Web Services.

According to outage-tracking website Downdetector.com, more than 15,000 users in the United States have reported issues with Alexa on Sunday afternoon. While most users appeared to be facing problems with the voice control functions, others flagged connectivity issues. Going by the outage tracking data the issue appears to have been resolved for some in the ensuing hours.

The company's cloud service division - Amazon Web Services - said that it was investigating an issue where users attempting to access AWS signup were receiving error messages. Hundreds of users reported issues with the platform on Sunday.

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While the number of affected users in India appear to be lower, downdetector also noted a spike in Alexa complaints starting from 6:30 pm. Closer to home, the issues reported by disgruntled users pertain to the server connection, website and app.

“Interesting, seems Alexa is down. Its devices work, but the voice server seems to be offline. Every time you activate Alexa via voice command, it instantly goes back to standby. It'd be nice if Amazon would report outages like this to their customers just to keep us informed,” tweeted one user.

“My toddler keeps yelling at them to play wheels on the bus,” lamented another.

Several alarmed netizens also broached the possibility that Alexa had been 'hacked' - prompting an outpouring of clarifications and counterpoints. 

(With inputs from agencies)