The worldwide app outage that left owners unable to connect to their cars was caused by a worldwide app server going down. For those who have been mostly dependent on their phones, that means being locked out of their vehicles. After receiving complaints from owners of the electric car, Electrek reported the issue and it seemed like the problem only affected drivers in North America. The owner of the app in South Korea sent a message to Musk about a server error, and the CEO replied that he was checking it out.
Checking.
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November 19, 2021.
Other owners called for roadside assistance and delayed their plans for the night. The update to the application that was rolled out by the automaker included a feature that was not implemented by the company. Since Musk has yet to follow up on his initial response, it's unclear if that was connected to the outage. It looks like the problem is getting solved. Downdetector received as many as 543 reports a few hours ago, but now they're down to less than 100.
Being locked out of a vehicle is an ongoing problem as the auto industry moves to cloud services. It's still wise to keep a keycard/keyfob in case.
