Why did Instagram log me out? Is Instagram down? [Video]

WASHINGTON — Some users are being forced to log back in to Instagram after an overnight outage cut access to the social media site starting Thursday night. 

By Friday morning, Instagram, owned by Mark Zuckerberg’s social media company Meta, appeared to be back online for most viewers. Nearly four billion people — about half the world’s population — use communication apps developed by the company. 

Outage tracking site DownDetector.com shows user reports of trouble with Instagram began around 5 p.m. Eastern Thursday, with a peak of around 6,000 reports around 8 p.m. Half a day later, by 8 a.m., that number had dropped to around 400. 

Most of the reported problems had to do with issues logging into the app. It’s likely that at least some of the reports Friday morning were caused by users being forced to log back in after Instagram signed them out of their …