Popular Google services including its Gmail email service and Google Drive cloud storage were down for many users around the world on Thursday (Aug 20), with the US technology giant telling affected people they were “aware of a service disruption”.
Some of the complaints include issues sending emails on Gmail, posting messages in Google Chat, recording issues on Google Meet and creating files in Google Drive.
According to monitoring website DownDetector, there was a spike in reported problems with Gmail and other Google applications in the last 24 hours, peaking at about 3pm.
Replying to complaints, Google’s @Gmail Twitter feed said: “Thanks for reporting. We are aware of a service disruption at the moment.”
The message contained a link to a Gmail service details page that told users “we are continuing to investigate this issue,” and to check back later.
Google’s status dashboard for Gmail also stated that it will provide details on when it expects the problem to be resolved at a later time.
An update on the Google Drive dashboard said mitigation works are currently under way and error rates are decreasing.