According to DownDetector, thousands of users around the world were reporting outages. Photo: Getty

Online monitoring service DownDetector reported on Wednesday that the outage began around 12:00 GMT and affected Facebook as well as its Instagram and WhatsApp services.

"The issue has since been resolved and we should be back at 100 percent for everyone," the company tweeted at 00:06 GMT on Thursday, adding they were sorry for "any inconvenience".

A Facebook spokesperson, also speaking on behalf of Facebook-owned Instagram and WhatsApp, explained that a "routine maintenance operation" accidentally triggered a bug that made it difficult for users to upload or send photos and videos, US media reported.

#Facebookdown and #instagramdown were trending on Twitter as users around the world reported these apps were not functioning.

Later in the day, Twitter also said it was experiencing issues with its platform. 

According to DownDetector, thousands of users around the world were reporting outages, with Europe and North America being the most affected. Both individual users, as well as businesses and organisations, were affected. 

"Yes, we are affected by #instagramdown, too," the CIA tweeted during the outage.

Earlier this year, an outage lasting as long as 24 hours that hit Facebook services was blamed on a "server configuration change". 

The March 13 outage was believed to be the worst ever for the internet giant, which reaches an estimated 2.7 billion people with its core social network, Instagram and messaging applications.