Google Cloud disruption in London affects banks, courts and NHS services

A disruption at Google Cloud’s London data centre affected hundreds of websites and apps, including banking services, Royal Mail and Rightmove. NHS England and court services were also affected, showing how a problem with one cloud provider can disrupt both everyday services and public operations.

Google said its engineers were investigating an issue in the europe-west2 region, which began at about 7am BST. Down Detector recorded 480 reports involving Lloyds Bank by 9am; Revolut had more than 1,458 reports by 8.02am, with customers reporting problems opening the app, transferring money and making card payments. The Criminal Bar Association said outages to the courts’ Cloud Video Platform had prevented some hearings from proceeding and hampered efforts to clear backlogs.