Postmortem: # What services were affected? For how long?

From approximately 1:30 p.m. on Monday, April 14  to 7 a.m. on Wednesday, April 16, there were widespread intermittent network connectivity issues on campus. 

Who was affected?

The network outage had its most significant impact on wireless devices. The entire on-campus Brown Community was affected in an intermittent and unpredictable fashion.

What happened?

On Monday, April 14, 2025 we received reports of multiple connectivity issues across campus. OIT posted an alert on our Statuspage at 3:18 p.m. We completed an extensive analysis with support from our network equipment vendor and created a plan to replace critical network hardware to resolve this problem. As a part of troubleshooting this issue, the network equipment vendor also recommended a software upgrade to correct known software defects. This upgrade was completed successfully by 6:30 a.m., on Tuesday, April 15. 

To minimize the impact of the hardware replacement on the Brown community, which could result in stopping all Wi-Fi service on campus for up to 30 minutes, we scheduled this work during our early morning maintenance window of 5 a.m. to 8 a.m. on Wednesday, April 16. OIT alerted the community about the upcoming outage, via Statuspage on Tuesday, April 15, at 4:32 p.m. 

On Wednesday, April 16, the hardware replacement work was completed by 7 a.m. We conducted initial testing which was successful, and monitored the network performance for the next few hours to ensure stability. We considered the issue resolved at 10:54 a.m.

What is OIT doing about it?

OIT has actively engaged our network equipment vendor and conducted a root cause analysis, which identified hardware limitations that impacted capacity and performance. We replaced the hardware, conducted testing to ensure the issue was fixed, and after 24 hours of monitoring, the services now seem stable. We will continue to monitor and respond to any further problems.

Resolved: A fix has been implemented, and we will continue to monitor network performance throughout the day to ensure stability.

Investigating: We continue to experience intermittent Wi-Fi issues across campus. OIT is aware of the issue and has completed an extensive analysis with support from our network equipment vendor. We have created a plan to replace critical network hardware to resolve this problem. This operation may result in stopping all Wi-Fi service on campus for up to 30 minutes. To minimize the impact of this major change on the Brown community, we have scheduled this work during the maintenance window of 5 a.m. to 8 a.m. on Wednesday, April 16.

Investigating: We are currently experiencing intermittent issues with the Brown wireless network. OIT is aware of the issue and will be implementing a resolution tomorrow morning, April 15, from 6:00 am to 8:00 am.

Resolved: This incident has been resolved.

Investigating: As a temporary workaround, users can still call into Zoom meetings by telephone, or in some cases, you may want to use Google Meet in the short term for virtual meetings until Zoom resolves the global problem.

Investigating: We are currently experiencing a widespread issue with Zoom. The application is unresponsive, and users are unable to connect at this time. This is acknowledged by Zoom as a global problem and they are investigating. We will update this alert as we receive more information.

Resolved: This incident has been resolved.

Investigating: Because of a system problem on our integration platform, users of MyBrown, MyBrown for Alumni, and the BrownU mobile app may have a poor experience or may not see current information. OIT is currently investigating this issue.