Extensive Apple cloud services outages could pose problems for users

If you’re experiencing problems with your Apple cloud services today, you’re not alone. Small hiccups are common with cloud services, but Apple appears to be in the midst of an unusually extensive interruption of service.

The Apple System Status page shows a red “outage” label for scores of online features. Nearly all major iCloud syncing features (Mail, Notes, Calendar, Contacts, Keychain, and more) appear to be down. Photos and iMessage are two of the services Apple users rely on multiple times per day that may be inaccessible.

These outages may or may not affect you, depending on your geographic location. The fact that the status page shows a whopping fourteen services in the red (about one in five) is cause for concern. If any of the services are failing for you, there's not much you can do but wait for Apple or the service providers it partners with to fix it.

Some problems began shortly after 10 a.m. Pacific Time, and only worsened over time. At the time of this writing (11:30 a.m.) there has been no improvement.