Major Amazon Cloud Outage Disrupts Canadian Services, Affects Wealthsimple

Canadians experienced significant disruptions to several online services early on October 20, 2025, due to a major outage in Amazon’s cloud computing platform, Amazon Web Services (AWS). Confirmed reports indicate that prominent companies such as Wealthsimple and Coinbase were among those impacted by the technical difficulties that began in the middle of the night.

The outage primarily affected the US-EAST-1 Region of AWS, located in northern Virginia. This region serves as a crucial hub for many businesses that rely on AWS for their digital operations. By utilizing AWS, companies can avoid the costs associated with maintaining their own physical servers and infrastructure. Consequently, when AWS experiences disruptions, it can lead to widespread issues across various platforms and services.

As the situation unfolded, many Canadians reported difficulties accessing popular applications and websites. According to DownDetector, a website that monitors service outages, users experienced problems not only with Wealthsimple and Coinbase but also with other widely-used services such as Fortnite, Snapchat, Pinterest, and Instacart.

Despite the initial setbacks, both Wealthsimple and Coinbase have indicated that their services are largely back to normal following the outage. In statements to The Canadian Press, representatives from these companies confirmed that they worked swiftly to address the issues stemming from the AWS disruption.

The incident serves as a reminder of the reliance many businesses have on cloud services for their operations. As more companies shift towards cloud-based solutions, the impact of such outages can reverberate across various sectors, affecting both businesses and their customers.

While AWS continues to report ongoing issues, the recovery efforts by affected companies highlight the resilience of digital services in the face of technical challenges. This situation underscores the critical role that cloud infrastructure plays in the daily operations of modern businesses, as well as the potential vulnerabilities that come with such reliance.

As the day progresses, further updates on the status of AWS services are anticipated, with businesses and users alike hoping for a swift resolution to any remaining technical difficulties.