:: WhatsApp, a popular messaging service owned by Facebook Inc., suffered a widespread global outage on Wednesday that lasted for several hours before being resolved, the company said.

“Earlier today, WhatsApp users in all parts of the world were unable to access WhatsApp for a few hours. We have now fixed the issue and apologize for the inconvenience,” WhatsApp said in an e-mail late Wednesday afternoon.

WhatsApp was down in parts of the Middle East, India, Canada, the United States and Brazil. It affected people who use the service on Apple Inc’s iOS operating system, Alphabet Inc.’s Android and Microsoft Corp’s Windows mobile OS.

In Saudi Arabia, reports of users complaining about the service outage started at midnight. It was back at about 4 a.m.

Many users switched to Twitter to vent their frustrations. Immediately after the service was back, WhatsApp users also triumphantly announced it on Twitter.

In Brazil, where the professional class relies heavily on the messaging service, WhatsApp was down for about two and a half hours. Many users switched to rival system Telegram, which has picked up millions of customers in Brazil after two previous WhatsApp outages resulting from court orders.

WhatsApp’s is used by more than 1.2 billion people around the world and is a key tool for communications and commerce in many countries. The service was acquired by Facebook in 2014 for $19 billion.