Blizzard Servers Back Up: Warcraft, Overwatch Taken Offline, PoodleCorp Claims Responsibility

UPDATE: 8:15 a.m. EDT — Blizzard Entertainment announced it has restored access to its gaming servers.

The login issues have been resolved. Thanks for your patience and sorry for any inconvenience. #BlizzCS
— BlizzardCS (@BlizzardCS) September 21, 2016

UPDATE: 7:30 a.m. EDT — With about two hours since the DDoS attack began on the servers of Blizzard Entertainment, popular games like World of Warcraft and Overwatch are still inaccessible by players around the world.

PoodleCorp, which took responsibility for the latest DDoS attack on the gaming company, said it would stop the attack when its tweet announcing the attack was shared 3,000 times. And as of 7:30 a.m. EDT, it had been retweeted just over 1,100 times.

Some gamers, livid at the repeated interruption of Blizzard servers over the last few weeks, were angry with PoodleCorp for targeting the gaming company repeatedly.

@Support deactivate the user poodlecorp, they are using this platform as a way to receive attention for ddos'ing @Blizzard_Ent.
— chris krueger (@peachiestprince) September 21, 2016

@poodlecorp @blizzard_ent Does that mean once you get your 3k you will just do this again anyway?
— Alice Chan (@linddll77) September 21, 2016

@PoodleCorp @Blizzard_Ent why do you always ddos blizzard its annoying when I try to play wow or overwatch
— dragozillion (@dragozillion) September 21, 2016

UPDATE: 7 a.m. EDT — The DDoS attack against servers of gaming company Blizzard Entertainment that began around 5:30 a.m. Wednesday seemed to have reduced in efficacy, with some players saying they could log in to the servers and play.

@PoodleCorp @Blizzard_Ent lol dude, Blizzard is #Online.
I am playing a Blizzard game right now. You gotta do better than that.
— DJ Artie (@AuthurK) September 21, 2016

Even on tracking website downdetector.com, there were fewer reports of gamers facing problems. For its part though, Blizzard said it is still monitoring the ongoing DDoS attack.

We continue to actively monitor an ongoing DDOS attack against network providers, affecting latency/connections to our games. #BlizzCS
— BlizzardCS (@BlizzardCS) September 21, 2016

Original story:

Hours after it said it was stopping its attacks against Blizzard Entertainment, it seems that the hacking group calling itself PoodleCorp has taken down the company’s widely popular gaming servers again. And the group says it will reinstate the servers once its tweet has been shared 3,000 times.

Blizzard #Offline #PoodleCorp 3k retweets to bring @Blizzard_Ent online
— PoodleCorp (@PoodleCorp) September 21, 2016

Blizzard confirmed that it was investigating a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack against its network providers.

We are currently monitoring a DDOS attack against network providers which is affecting latency/connections to our games.
— BlizzardCS (@BlizzardCS) September 21, 2016

Three days ago, on Sept. 18, PoodleCorp had carried out a similar action, which had ended once it had been retweeted 2,000 times.

Attacks on @Blizzard_Ent are now over since 2k RTs #PoodleCorp #Online
— PoodleCorp (@PoodleCorp) September 19, 2016

It is not clear why the hacking group has been targeting the video game company repeatedly but gamers who are affected are clearly not happy, with some venting anger toward Blizzard.

@Blizzard_Ent for a game i payed hard earned 60 bucks for it sure seems easy for 15 year olds to take down your servers
— Ninjajimz11 (@ninja_jimz11) September 21, 2016

@PoodleCorp @Blizzard_Ent are you just hateful? Some people have nothing but the time they spend online because they are disabled. Sad for u
— REGINA WING (@reginawing73) September 21, 2016

@Blizzard_Ent. Blizzard I support you in most things but right now I'm paying for a service I can't use. 1 ddos ok 2 meh 3 4 not acceptable
— Duane Stevenson (@duane_stevenson) September 21, 2016

@Blizzard_Ent they want 3k retweets so why don't you just retweet their tweet and it will be done within about 10 minutes....
— Jack Easton (@NeonGenerationz) September 21, 2016

Some others took a more sympathetic approach to the company.

@Shiro_Longtail This it, it's not Blizzard being DDOS'ed, but network providers. Not much Blizzard CAN do.
— Zugrah - Argent Dawn (@ZugZugrah) September 21, 2016

@PoodleCorp You seem to be pushing the Blizzard thing a little hard.Looks like you're trying to take credit for something you didn't do.sad.
— hunter caton (@mrgrim5000) September 21, 2016

On Aug. 31, another big DDoS attack on Blizzard servers had prevented players from logging on for hours.

Gaming