Signal down across the world, users unable to send messages

It looks like Signal is facing a global outage with people across the world being unable to send messages on the app. Signal has also tweeted about this issued has mentioned “technical difficulties” affecting the app currently. 

Signal tweeted this from it's official handle roughly an hour ago and we checked our apps and were still facing the same issue. 

Signal has said that they are currently working on the issue and hope to restore things back to normal soon. 

For now, the app has also added a banner on top of chats that mentions - “Signal is experiencing technical difficulties. We are working hard to restore service as quickly as possible.”

Now, many people are speculating that this “technical difficulty” must be a result of the huge number of users Signal has gained almost overnight. Post January 6, Signal and Telegram has seen an unprecedented number of downloads with many WhatsApp users looking for more private options for messaging apps. 

Aruna Harder, Chief Operating Officer, Signal Messenger said, "We have been adding new servers and extra capacity at a record pace every single day this week, but today exceeded even our most optimistic projections. Millions upon millions of new users are sending a message that privacy matters, and we are working hard to restore service for them as quickly as possible."

Compared to the other two, Telegram and WhatsApp, Signal collects no data from its users and has also promised that it is never going to share user data or show in-app ads. 

Signal has not explained what might have led to today's issue yet. 

Literally moments after Elon Musk had tweeted to endorse Signal over WhatsApp when the later shared its new privacy policy, Signal had faced issues with new registrations. 

Thanks to a huge influx of users, verification codes were not reaching new users leaving them unable to register on the app. 

This issue was subsequently fixed but it looks like Signal, in general, might be having teething issues while dealing with volumes - it is not impossible. For now, it remains to be seen how soon Signal manages to come around.