Small Business
Walmart Website Down on Cyber Tuesday – Too Much Traffic, Or DOS Attack?
Walmart.com, the e-commerce website of the world's largest retailer, experienced an outage on Tuesday evening, Cyber Tuesday, which is traditionally the second biggest online holiday shopping day of the year. The outage affected all U.S. customers.
Dec. 04, 2013
Latest Update: 9:07 pm, CST:
Walmart.com, the e-commerce website of the world's largest retailer, experienced an outage on Tuesday evening, Cyber Tuesday, which is traditionally the second biggest online holiday shopping day of the year. The outage lasted from about 8-9 pm CST. (Although, as of this update, some users on the east coast and Midwest are still experiencing website access problems.)
The company's website initially displayed a message about data security, then about 30 minutes later, stated the website was down for scheduled maintenance.
— Updated: 8:16 pm, CST —
The Walmart.com website has now changed its message to:
- Walmart.com Scheduled Maintenance
- Walmart.com is temporarily unavailable while we make important upgrades to our site. We appreciate your patience and invite you to return soon.
- If you need immediate assistance, please email us at help@walmart.com.
Shortly thereafter, the site returns to the original, “Your information is secure…” message.
“It seems odd that the world's largest retailer would schedule server maintenance during mid-evening on a Christmas shopping day,” said Doug Sleeter, president of the Pleasanton, California-based technology consulting firm, The Sleeter Group.
— Original Post at 7:59 pm, CST —
Is Walmart.com off-line right now? Yes, but is it the result of a Denial of Service attack, or just a heavy influx of visitors? Several people contacted by CPA Practice Advisor also attempted to go to the site in the last hour, only to receive a message of:
- “Your information is secure and you'll be able to complete your order shortly. We're working on getting you to the next step in checkout. Thanks for your patience.”
The message even occurred for people who had never shopped on Walmart's website, or hadn't in a long time. Odds are, it's likely heavy visitor traffic, or an internal server error.
“I've never ordered online online from Wally World or ever entered any personal data into the website. Still, just trying to look at their website I'm getting [the message noted above],” said Jason Chance, from Enid, Oklahoma.
Richard Roppa, a technology consultant in Houston, Texas, said he had the same experience.
From mobile devices, people have reported seeing a statement that said: “Our site is extra busy and we are working to get you there in a moment.”
This writer checked the Walmart website at about 8:00 pm CST on Tuesday, only to receive that same message.
We will update as more information is available.