Internet outages briefly disrupt access to websites, apps
Hong Kong: A wave of brief internet outages hit the websites and apps of dozens of financial institutions, airlines and other companies across the globe Thursday.
The Hong Kong Stock Exchange said in a post on Twitter Thursday afternoon Hong Kong time that its site was facing technical issues and that it was investigating. It said in another post 17 minutes later that its websites were back to normal.
Internet monitoring websites including ThousandEyes, Downdetector.com and fing.com showed dozens of disruptions, including to U.S.-based airlines.
Many of the outages were reported by people in Australia trying to do banking, book flights and access postal services.
Australia Post, the country's postal service, said on Twitter that an external outage had impacted a number of its services, and that while most services had come back online, they were continuing to monitor and investigate.
Many services were up and running after an hour or so but the affected companies said they were working overtime to prevent further problems.
Banking services were severely disrupted, with Westpac, the Commonwealth, ANZ and St George all down, along with the website of the Reserve Bank of Australia, the country's central bank. The Reserve Bank cancelled a bond-buying operation due to technical difficulties facing several banks that were to participate.
Services have mostly been restored.
Virgin Australia said flights were largely operating as scheduled after it restored access to its website and guest contact center.
Virgin Australia was one of many organizations to experience an outage with the Akamai content delivery system today, it said. We are working with them to ensure that necessary measures are taken to prevent these outages from reoccurring.
Akamai, based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, counts some of the world's biggest companies and banks as customers. The company said in a statement Thursday that it was aware of the issue and working to restore services as soon as possible.
The disruptions came just days after many of the world's top websites went offline briefly due to a problem with software at Fastly, another major web services company. The company blamed the problem on a software bug that was triggered when a customer changed a setting.
Brief internet service outages are not uncommon and are only rarely the result of hacking or other mischief. But the outages have underscored how vital a small number of behind-the-scenes companies have become to running the internet. (AP)
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Allahabad HC orders probe into 'reinstatement' of teacher in UP's Barabanki
Lucknow (PTI): The Lucknow Bench of the Allahabad High Court on Friday ordered a probe by the special task force (STF) into alleged irregularities in the rejoining of a teacher at City Intermediate College in Barabanki, observing that the reinstatement appeared to be prima facie illegal.
The court also directed the recovery of the salary paid to the teacher during the disputed period.
A bench of Justice Rajeev Singh passed the order on a petition filed by the college management committee. The court expressed doubts over the roles of the District Inspector of Schools (DIOS), Barabanki, the college principal and the teacher concerned and hence, directed a detailed inquiry into the matter.
Taking note of alleged manipulation of records and misleading submissions, the court ordered the immediate transfer of the Barabanki DIOS to ensure a fair probe. It also directed the initiation of disciplinary proceedings against the then joint director of education of the Ayodhya division.
In its order, the court found that the teacher, Abhay Kumar, was initially appointed as an assistant teacher in 2018 but joined an Eklavya Model Residential School in Chhattisgarh as a lecturer in June 2024 without obtaining permission from the management. His subsequent request to retain the lien was rejected.
Despite this, he was allowed to rejoin the Barabanki College in September 2025 on the directions of the joint director of education and the DIOS, and was even paid the salary for October 2025. The court termed the rejoining "wholly illegal" and lacking any legal basis.
The bench also expressed concern over lapses in communication within the education department and directed the Uttar Pradesh chief secretary to ensure that official orders are communicated through email and WhatsApp as well, to prevent disputes.
The matter is next listed for hearing on May 28 when a compliance report is sought.
