Small business websites offline as Discount Domains hit by ‘network issues’

There is frustration for small business owners amid a major web hosting outage. Image / 123RF

Numerous small business websites are offline today after unspecified “network issues” hit web hosting firm Discount Domains about 6am.

Parent company Free Parking is also suffering issues.

Some in the tech community fear thousands of businesses could be affected. Firms and customers have complained on social media about a lack of communication and waiting times of more than 90 minutes for Discount Domains’ support desk.

Sue Hudson, owner of Ellerslie business Renew Skin and Body, took to Facebook to alert customers that her website was down “along with a lot of other poor people who use Discount Domains”.

She later told the Herald she learned her site was offline only when customers alerted her.

With Discount Domains’ email also offline, she tried to reach the firm by phone. “I gave up after an hour and a half.”

She intended to drop Discount Domains for another web host, once she could get through.

Builderscrack co-founder Jeremy Wyn-Harris told the Herald his business was one of the affected customers.

“But their support team didn’t have anything useful to say except that they did not have a resolution time and that their engineers are looking into it. We’ve had issues since about 6.15am this morning.”

About 11.30am, Discount Domains posted a brief network status message, saying: “We are currently experiencing issues with our Discount Domains customer portal and Nameserver services. Our engineers are aware of the situation and are investigating the issue.”

Wyn-Harris said that, after taking hours to appear, the update left him none the wiser.

Free Parking’s network status page led to a 404 error.

In the absence of any detailed explanation, the tech community speculated on Geekzone, Reddit and social media about a possible ransomware or DDoS attack, but there was no clear indication of the cause.

With phones jammed and many of their own systems offline, Discount Domains and Free Parking could not be reached immediately for comment.

“It looks like Discount Domains is on fire this morning,” web developer Ian Simpson posted to X, in a typical comment.

Chris Keall is an Auckland-based member of the Herald’s business team. He joined the Herald in 2018 and is the technology editor and a senior business writer.