Facebook and Instagram experience outages - WSMV News 4

(CNN Money) -- Facebook has confirmed a widespread outage impacting users' ability to access the social network and Instagram across the U.S. and parts of Europe.

The outage started around 8:20 a.m. ET, according to DownDetector.com, a site that monitors service disruptions. Users of the social platforms reported difficulty accessing the Facebook through its apps and website.

The outages impacted users not only in the U.S. but Greece, the UK, Poland and other European countries.

"We're aware that some people are currently having trouble accessing Facebook and Instagram. We're working to get things back to normal as quickly as possible," a Facebook spokesperson said in a statement.

Instagram, which is owned by Facebook, was also down for a short time.

The company did not clarify the reason for the outages.

The outages were poorly timed for the Menlo Park, California-based company. CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced new Oculus hardware, called Oculus Go, at an event in San Jose as Facebook continued to experience issues.

Facebook has had a rocky few months. It continues to battle PR issues related to enabling Russian interference in the 2016 election and most recently, Zuckerberg was criticized for "visiting" a devastated Puerto Rico as a cartoon character in VR.

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