YouTube, Hangouts, Gmail hit by partial outages

Urs Holzle, who overseas Google’s data centers, said the problem came from a router failure in Atlanta and wasn’t virus-related.

Google’s services saw a partial outage around the globe. (REUTERS)

Major Google services including YouTube, video-calling and Gmail were hit by partial outages Thursday while the internet giant's infrastructure is experiencing record usage during the coronavirus pandemic.

People around the world tweeted that various services were down. Urs Holzle, who overseas Google's data centers, said the problem came from a router failure in Atlanta and wasn't virus-related.

"This wasn't related to traffic levels or any kind of overload, our network is not stressed by Covid-19," Holzle said on Twitter. "Things should be back to normal now."

Alphabet Inc.'s Google has largely been able to keep its services running as millions of people have been forced to stay at home to help slow the spread of the virus. The company's Hangouts video-calling service is being used by students around the world to attend class remotely.

YouTube is seeing a surge in traffic as more people look for entertainment and information online. The company has already lowered the default quality of streamed video to reduce the toll on internet service providers.