Blackboard/MyMason Unavailable

June 16, 2020 7:49 a.m.
Outage category: 
Blackboard
Location: 
All Blackboard users
Status: 
Open
Resolved alert: 
06/11/2020 10:43 pm

Blackboard is unavailable for all users. The issue began around 4:12 PM ET. We are working with Blackboard to restore service and will update as soon as possible.

Initial symptoms: 

Users were not able to log into Blackboard or Collaborate.

Duration: 
06/11/2020 4:12 pm - 06/11/2020 10:43 pm
Impact to Mason: 

Blackboard was unavailable.

Affected Services: 
Class Collaborate (formerly Blackboard Collaborate Ultra), Blackboard Courses
ROOT CAUSE ANALYSIS
Cause: 

A Blackboard Engineer remediating an unrelated issue caused the GMU production database to go offline due to human error.

Resolution: 

Once the database was available again and application servers could connect to it, service was restored.

Prevention: 

Blackboard continues to review and validate staffing policies, training, and change management procedures. Corrective action with the responsible staff has been taken by the management team. The team will continue to automate system admin activities via infrastructure as code, in order to remove the possibility of human error.

STATISTICS
Service Team: 
Online Learning Resources