Hardware failure blamed for Netflix outage

Netflix's operations were hit by faulty hardware

Online video service Netflix is placing the blame for its recent shipping outage on bad hardware.

In a post to the company's official blog, Netflix IT head Mike Osier explained that a faulty hardware component lead to corruption issues within the company's shipping system.

Osier said that the issue was first discovered on August 11th and continued until the database was transferred to another system. Further complicating matters was the fact that the component responsible for the issue was reporting no detectable errors.

"Over the course of the day, we began experiencing similar problems in peripheral databases until our shipping system went down," he wrote.

"It was going to be a long night."

The outage within the shipping system caused the entire mail-order service to grind to a halt. Without the ability to process incoming discs, the company had no way to update returns and ship out new orders.

The result was an outage for millions of customers that lasted through most of the week as the company worked to restore the system and catch its distribution centers up on backlogged orders.

The company's web-based streaming video service was not affected by the outage.

With the faulty component replaced and the system restored, Netflix now believes that the issue has been resolved for good. The company is now working on steps to prevent a similar occurrence in the future.

"We’ve taken steps to fortify our shipping system with the acquisition of additional equipment and worked with our vendors to verify we’re in good shape elsewhere," said Osier.