Elon Musk’s Starlink network has “mostly recovered” after experiencing a global outage due to an internal software services failure.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The internet service provider made a post about the outage on X just after 6am AEST.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“Starlink is currently in a network outage and we are actively implementing a solution. We appreciate your patience, we’ll share an update once this issue is resolved,” it said.<\/p>\n
The Starlink website featured a banner that said: “Starlink is currently experiencing a service outage. Our team is investigating.”\u00a0<\/p>\n
The website’s outage map was also not loading.\u00a0<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The Starlink website featured a banner about the outage.\u00a0 (Starlink)<\/p>\n
Starlink vice-president of engineering Michael Nicholls said the outage was caused by an internal software failure.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“Starlink has now mostly recovered from the network outage, which lasted approximately 2.5 hours,” he wrote on X.<\/p>\n
“The outage was due to failure of key internal software services that operate the core network. \u00a0<\/p>\n
“We apologize for the temporary disruption in our service; we are deeply committed to providing a highly reliable network, and will fully root cause this issue and ensure it does not occur again.”<\/p>\n
At the peak of the outage, there were more than 61,000 users reporting issues with Starlink on Downdetector, a website that collates status reports from various sources to track outages.<\/p>\n
Mr Musk apologised on X for the outage.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“SpaceX will remedy root cause to ensure it doesn\u2019t happen again,” he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Unlike most other internet service providers, Starlink uses a satellite internet constellation.\u00a0<\/p>\n
It is a wholly owned subsidiary of Elon Musk’s space exploration company SpaceX.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Users in regional Australia have reported being impacted by the outage, posting in Facebook group Starlink Users Australia. \u00a0<\/p>\n
Starlink is said to have 200,000 users in Australia and 6 million users globally.\u00a0<\/p>\n
SpaceX has launched more than 8,000 Starlink satellites since 2020.\u00a0<\/p>\n
It now offers service in over 140 countries and territories.<\/p>\n
Internet expert suspects bad update<\/p>\n
Doug Madory, an expert at the internet analysis firm Kentik, said he was starting to see traffic come back at 5:28pm ET (7:58am AEST), after Starlink appeared to have experienced a “total outage” at about 3:13pm (5:13am AEST).<\/p>\n
The outage was global, Mr Madory said, adding that such a sweeping interruption in service was unusual.<\/p>\n
With Starlink topping 6 million users worldwide, SpaceX is now focused on its nascent direct-to-cell business by adding larger satellites to its constellation to boost the network’s internet speeds and bandwidth.<\/p>\n
“I’d speculate this is a bad software update, not entirely dissimilar to the CrowdStrike mess with Windows last year, or a cyber attack,” said Gregory Falco, director of a space and cybersecurity laboratory at Cornell University.<\/p>\n