Normally BlackBerry service outages aren’t worth much attention because they’re usually resolved within the day, but there’s a particularly big one that has gone for three days now in some areas. The initial outage knocked out instant messaging (including BBM), e-mail, and web browsing in some capacity. At the very least, it sounds like RIM has fixed the problem, and any current delays are just an issue of chewing through the backlog of pending BlackBerry message deliveries. On their Facebook page, RIM said:
“The messaging and browsing delays being experienced by BlackBerry users in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, India, Brazil, Chile and Argentina were caused by a core switch failure within RIM’s infrastructure. Although the system is designed to failover to a back-up switch, the failover did not function as previously tested. As a result, a large backlog of data was generated, and we are now working to clear that backlog and restore normal service as quickly as possible. We apologize for any inconvenience, and we will continue to keep you informed.”
Since web and messaging data are pumped through RIM’s central servers for security and compression, BlackBerry service depends on those servers being up. Of course, the vast majority of the time everything operates fine, but this is far from the first time we’ve seen a BlackBerry outage, and for many, going three days without a working smartphone will be the last straw. In BlackBerry’s hey day, those servers were very much needed to help service providers transition to wireless data services, but at times like this, it’s easy to feel like that time has gone. Android and iOS devices are sold and operate without going through some additional back-end rigamarole beyond the usual communication over carrier networks, and they do just fine – is there any good reason why BlackBerry can’t or shouldn’t?
You can keep tabs on official updates over here. Any of you guys left in the dark?