Apple's iCloud Backup service is currently down, with issues first detected about 24 hours ago but spreading to users around the world in recent hours.
Little is known at this point about the causes of the outage, but Apple itself confirmed the problems on its system status page, saying that iCloud Backup programs first started on June 27, with only a handful of users initially affected.
Of course, Apple is currently downplaying the outage, saying that "less than 1% of users are affected," but this is undoubtedly a big problem for customers who wanted to create iCloud backups and set up new devices using their backups.
While most people believe that Apple's iCloud Backup service is "down" due to a cyberattack, there is absolutely no evidence that this is the case, with Apple remaining completely tight-lipped on such details.
However, the company acknowledges that “users may not be able to restore an iCloud backup,” and this is especially frustrating when it comes to setting up new devices. Apple who buy new iPhones cannot use iClouds to transfer data from one device to another, and the workaround in this case is to switch to iTunes backups stored locally to migrate data.
We'll keep an eye on how Apple addresses the issue in the coming hours, but for now, turning to iTunes for backup and restore seems to be the best option, especially since dealing with the outage seems to be taking longer than expected.
All other services appear to be working properly, according to Apple's system status page, and the rest of iCloud services are also working, including iCloud Mail, iCloud accounts and sign-in, and iCloud storage upgrades. This is likely a server issue, and a fix should only be a few hours away.
