Windows Update Led to Skype Outage

VoIP operator Skype says all the system restarts prompted by last week's Windows update exposed a bug which disrupted Skype's peer-to-peer network.

Folks who use the popular VoIP applications Skype no doubt noticed that last week was pretty rough, with serious service disruptions and refused logins impacting millions of users around the world. Now, Skype is back online, and the company has revealed the cause of the problem: yes, there was a bug in Skype’s systems, but it was only revealed by the worldwide wave of system restarts prompted by the Windows updates released last week by Microsoft.

"The disruption was triggered by a massive restart of our users’ computers across the globe within a very short timeframe as they re-booted after receiving a routine set of patches through Windows Update," wrote Villu Arak on Skype’s "Heartbeat" blog. "The high number of restarts affected Skype’s network resources. This caused a flood of log-in requests, which, combined with the lack of peer-to-peer network resources, prompted a chain reaction that had a critical impact."

Skype says the cause of the disruption has been identified, and the company can confirm that no malicious activity took place that would have compromised users’ security. However, while Skype appears to have resumed normal operation and the company says it has rolled out fixes to prevent similar problems in the future, users may not know for certain whether Skype can weather another Patch Tuesday until…well, the next Patch Tuesday which forces a restart.

"We would like to point out that very few technologies or communications networks today are guaranteed to operate without interruptions," wrote Arak. "We are very proud that over the four years of its operation, Skype has provided a technically resilient communications tool to millions of people worldwide."