Plusnet users have been experiencing intermittent service outages due to a DNS malfunction at the internet service provider’s HQ, leaving them unable to access websites from their broadband connection.
We’re really sorry about the current problems, we’re working as quickly as possible to resolve this and we will keep you updated.
— Plusnet (@Plusnet) September 10, 2015
The outage leaves users nominally connected to the internet, but unable to resolve URLs to working web pages. A short-term fix, for users who can access the net through another means, is to switch their DNS server to Google Public DNS, following the company’s own instructions.
The issue at the heart of the malfunction is the domain name system, the technology that converts a web address such as “theguardian.com” into the IP address such as “77.91.252.10”, which tells the computer the actual location of the server it is trying to connect to. DNS acts like a phone book, linking the name to the number, and when the DNS server is down, as with Plusnet, machines cannot tell where a URL is telling them to connect.
Switching to Google’s public DNS, which has the memorable IP address “8.8.8.8”, replaces Plusnet’s DNS servers with Google’s own, which are still working.
In a statement, Plusnet said: “Since early this morning we’ve experienced an outage which affected our phone and broadband service as well as our website. We’ve worked throughout the night to resolve this and have made a lot of progress with most of our customers now up and running. However we still have a few issues which we’re working to solve as soon as possible. We would like to sincerely apologise to our customers for the inconvenience caused.”
The company’s services were restored on Thursday afternoon, and the company added: “All our services are now fully restored, including the Plusnet website. Thank you for your patience, we’re really sorry this has happened and would like to apologise for the disruption you’ve experienced.”
