Thousands of people have reported that the National Lottery has crashed in the last 24 hours.
The dreaded ‘Blue Screen of Death’ error hit the gaming platform, which is played by close to 45 million users, just after Friday’s Euro Millions game.
According to DownDetector, which monitors IT outages across the globe, issues with the website and the mobile app began just before 9pm.
But more than 24 hours later, they remain unresolved, leaving players locked out.
This means that users cannot purchase new tickets – or check the numbers to find out if they have won.
Issues are registered across the country with hotspots being located in Glasgow, Manchester and London.
A message on the National Lottery website reads: ‘Please bear with us. Our online services are temporarily unavailable.
‘Sorry about that – we’ll get you back in the game as soon as possible.’
Meanwhile, the screen of the app says: ‘Sorry, our app is unable to load for you.’
DownDetector is currently showing more than 2,000 reports that the National Lottery is down making this a significant issue.
This comes just a day after a major IT outage caused worldwide chaos, affecting banks, airlines, hospitals and retail stores.
Crowdstrike, the cyber-security firm behind the nightmare, has admitted that the problem was caused by an update to its antivirus software, which is designed to protect Microsoft Windows devices from malicious attacks.
It said that it has fixed the update, but admitted it could be ‘some time’ before all systems are back up and running.
It is unclear if the two are related, but people have rushed to social media to air their frustration about the outage.
One user wrote on X: ‘I take it nobody’s National Lottery app is working? Email saying I’ve won a prize, probably £2.70, but can’t log on in app or on website.’
Another wrote: ‘Still can’t get into The National Lottery ! It’s now 9.30am on Saturday. When and what has happened?’
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