Josh Hendrickson
Garmin, maker of smart and fitness watchers, is currently suffering a massive outage that affects its Connect Services, Connect website, mobile app, and call center. The issue started yesterday and is ongoing. For its part, Garmin has acknowledged the problem but not provided a reason why.
At the moment, all we have to go on is speculation. Several outlets, including ZDNet, have suggested ransomware is that cause, but that information comes from supposed employee tweets and a leaked internal document.
This outage also affects our call centers, and we are currently unable to receive any calls, emails or online chats. We are working to resolve this issue as quickly as possible and apologize for this inconvenience. (2/2)
— Garmin (@Garmin) July 23, 2020
When we searched for that information, we couldn’t find those tweets or confirm their accuracy, nor could any of the other outlets.
What we do know is that Garmin is unable to answer calls, emails, and online chats sent by users. It admitted as much in a tweet it sent out yesterday. Garmin Connect, its website, and mobile app are also down. According to ZDNet, flyGarmin, a service used by pilots, is also down.
Garmin Connect is the service that allows Garmin devices to track an athlete’s performance. Without it, you can’t sync your phone with your Garmin devices, like smartwatches and cycling computers. That’s left Garmin owners searching for a third-party workaround to sync their devices while waiting for a solution. Garmin still hasn’t confirmed the reason for the outage, but we’ll update this post when they do.
