App Store down? It's not just you (and iTunes is hit too)

Apple may have had a good Monday with the launch of the Apple Watch and the new MacBook, but Wednesday is proving to be a downer with App Store and iTunes problems meaning new downloads and updates are unavailable for many. The downtime began more than five and a half hours ago, according to Apple's own service status page, with users unable to access not only the App Store and iTunes for software, music, and video downloads, but the iBooks Store and Mac App Store also affected.

Attempting to download a new app from iTunes on the desktop, for instance, summons instead the warning that the title isn't available in your country's store. On an iPhone, meanwhile, hitting "Get" to grab a free app, or attempting to purchase a paid title, sees the progress icon spin briefly and then reset.

Similarly, attempting to update apps through the App Store also gets the same spinning failure.

While the iTunes catalog can be browsed, actually trying to download a title – whether it's music, a TV show, or a movie – leads to another disappointment.

Apple is yet to publicly comment on the problems, or indeed give an estimate of when the services should be restored.

Issues were initially observed in multiple geographies, including the US and UK, but according to an update to the status page now affects every user.

Apple earlier suffered a roughly four hour downtime for iCloud Mail and the iCloud sign-in system, though the issue is now said to be resolved. Attempting to actually activate a new or restored device should encounter no problems, and services like Beats Music and iMessage should be operating as normal.

Update: In a statement to CNBC, Apple blamed a networking error for the downtime, which the company says its engineers are still working on addressing.

"We apologize to our customers experiencing problems with iTunes and other services this morning. The cause was an internal DNS error at Apple. We're working to make all of the services available to customers as soon as possible, and we thank everyone for their patience" Apple spokesperson

Update 2: The App Store, iTunes, Mac App Store, and iBooks store are back online.

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