The Internal Revenue Service (IRS) experienced every developer’s worst nightmare when part of its website crashed on its busiest day of the year — tax day. Thanks to a weekend and a Washington, D.C., holiday, the last day to file federal income taxes fell on Tuesday, April 17 this year. On that day, the portion of the IRS website that accepts payments from checking or savings accounts was displaying a warning which said, “Alert: This service is currently unavailable. We apologize for any inconvenience.”
In response to the outage, Acting IRS Commissioner David Kautter announced that the agency would accept tax filings through Wednesday, April 18, without imposing a penalty. “This is the busiest tax day of the year, and the IRS apologizes for the inconvenience this system issue caused for taxpayers,” said Kautter. “The IRS appreciates everyone’s patience during this period. The extra time will help taxpayers affected by this situation.”
The agency does not believe a cyberattack caused the outage, but it hasn’t yet detailed the cause of the problem.
