MSN Messenger cannot log this morning

[CougTek]

Am I the only one to be affected? I tried several times, certain that I don't make a mistake when typing my password, but I receive the message that the connection failed either because their server is too busy or because my connection is at fault. I have been on the Net since 9am this morning, so I think my connection is just fine.

Maybe Microsoft MSN server has been affected by a DoS attack?

 

[Groltz]

Am I the only one to be affected?

Not working for me either.

 

[honold]

same here (saint louis missouri)

 

[Groltz]

Looks like everyone is in the dark as to why this outage is happening:

http://www.msfn.org/comments.php?catid=1&id=350

 

[NRG = mc²]

Wasn't working for me either earlier but it is now.

 

[Fushigi]

From infoworld:

MICROSOFT'S MSN MESSENGER service went down Monday, leaving most of the instant messaging software's 75 million worldwide users without access to the service for more than five hours.

According to a Microsoft spokesman, the service went down at approximately 6 a.m. PST, and the root cause of the outage is still unknown.

The outage affected all of Microsoft's .Net Messenger Service users worldwide, including Windows Messenger and MSN Messenger subscribers, according to a statement from Larry Grothaus, lead product manager for MSN. .Net Messenger Service is the back-end service that powers both the Windows Messenger and the MSN Messenger clients. The problems occurred somewhere in the .Net Messenger Service, Grothaus said. MSN Hotmail e-mail service and other MSN services were not affected, he added.

Although service was restored for some users by about 11 a.m. PST, a number of users were still unable to log on to the messaging software into the afternoon. Microsoft is not seeing any more difficulties with the service right now, but some users may still be shut out as the service scales back up, according to Grothaus.

"It looks from what I've seen that [the service] is scaling back up. Some users may be having a little trouble getting on, but it just because it is just an issue of scaling the service back up and getting everybody back on the authentication servers," Grothaus said.

Customers can obtain .Net Messenger Service status information at http://messenger.msn.com/support/status.asp.

Last week, Microsoft's Passport service suffered an outage.

Nothing really new to report, but you may want to bookmark the status page for future reference.

- Fushigi

 

[blakerwry]

getting everybody back on the authentication servers? did they lose everyones password? and have to go from backups?

 

[Cliptin]

getting everybody back on the authentication servers? did they lose everyones password? and have to go from backups?

My bet is that some kind of corruption propogated to whoknowswhere; and that once the problem is fixed the fix wil also propogate. Could have been something as simple as a DNS error or complex as database corruption.

 

[Dozer]

MSN Messenger...or Viagra

Sorry, couldn't resist!

 

[CougTek]

...did they lose everyones password? and have to go from backups?

Let's hope Davin doesn't work for them now. ;-)

 

[blakerwry]

my guess is database corruption.. somebody used an illegal character in their user/pass and it killed their database, eh? like a semi colon?... just kidding, even MS and more importantly it's database software should be able to catch that with simple error checking routines.

 

[honold]

http://www.internetwk.com/breakingNews/INW20030107S0004

let's kill this thread!

 

[blakerwry]

So was the "getting everyone back on the authentication servers" typical PR bull shit spin like I thought?

I really dislike it when people use "big words" to try and confuse/cloud the real issue.

 

[honold]

honestly, who cares what the real issue is if you can't do anything about it? the cookie monster could be eating their db's storage array for all i care, the point to me is that the service is either DOWN or UP.

if routers weren't properly pointing people to auth servers, or were blocking traffic, the statement would not have been false.

 

[blakerwry]

How could a simply change in a routing table get changed to "getting everybody back on the auth server"

Wouldn't an routing change on MSN's network be pretty quick as well?

 

[honold]

because if the routing was bad, they were off it. that means they needed to get back on!