Facebook Is Down for Maintenance, faces hordes of complaints

Computers Tech, Software & Programming |

By MAJOR TOM | October 13, 2009

After a database problem knocked out the accounts of about 150,000 Facebook users for more than a week, the social networking site said today that most are now back up and running.

Despit the fix, many of the 150,000 users affected by the problem are still expressing frustration and anger with the social network.

The account problems were caused by “several technical issues” with a single database, Brandee Barker, a Facebook spokeswoman, told Computerworld in an e-mail. Barker didn’t provide details on what caused the problem, but said that the issues have been corrected.

Thousands of Facebook users who have been unable to access their accounts for nearly a week and a half now are now seeing their profiles restored–but some data related to recent profile updates may have been lost.

What happened? According to Facebook, the replacement of profiles and login screens with a “down for maintenance” notice–which appears to have started on October 3–stemmed from “a technical issue with a single database.” The company has stressed that there is no chance that it was due to hackers or other malicious activity.

In response to user complaints, Facebook posted a note on its site on Oct. 6, about three days after the first account was dropped. “We are experiencing a technical issue with one of our databases that is resulting in an extended period of maintenance for some of you. We are working on a fix and hope to have this resolved in the next 24 hours,” noted the post.

The message didn’t go over well with a lot of users who didn’t see any progress over the next 24 hours or even in another week. The Oct. 6 message was facebook’s only update about the situation.

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