Not just DBS and Citibank: WhatsApp, Facebook and Instagram users also reported outages on Saturday

Online services for DBS and Citibank were fully restored by Sunday morning (Oct 15) after outages the day before affected many.

But the two banks were not alone.

The Downdetector website, which tracks service disruptions, also received a surge of outage reports at around the same time on Saturday for the following online services:

• WhatsApp
• Singtel
• M1
• Starhub
• Facebook
• MyRepublic
• Visa 
• Simba
• Instagram
• Call Of Duty
• Steam
• League Of Legends: Wild Rift
• Standard Chartered
• Grab
• Telegram

Singtel posted on its social media on Saturday afternoon: "We understand that some customers have not been able to access some social media platforms and banking services. Our engineering teams have checked and have verified that our networks are working as normal."

StarHub posted a similar statement: "We understand some of our customers have been experiencing disruptions while trying to access digital services. StarHub has verified that our network and systems are operating normally, and will continue to monitor for any issues."

Another bank, OCBC, also shared this Facebook post on Saturday evening: "Dear customers, due to service disruptions to DBS and Citibank, some of you have not been able to complete your transactions."

The bank said OCBC transactions would not go through in the following cases:

• Transferring funds via FAST or PayNow to DBS, POSB and Citibank accounts/cards.
• Any credit or debit card being used on a DBS payment terminal.
• Use of DBS or POSB Credit/Debit card for payments on OCBC or other bank payment terminals.

So what happened?

DBS said in its Facebook post on Saturday night: "The service disruption was caused by an issue at a data centre. The data centre provider, Equinix, has issued a statement on the incident (which affected various organisations) and is conducting a thorough investigation."

Equinix told The Straits Times: “The technical issue has since been resolved, and we are in contact with those impacted customers and have expressed our sincere apologies.”