Amazon Faces Outages Linked to AI-Generated Code Changes

Amazon experienced significant outages affecting its retail website and app, including a six-hour crash that hindered customer transactions. The outages have been attributed to 'Gen-AI assisted changes' in code, leading to internal discussions about the fragility of their infrastructure. Despite these incidents, Amazon disputes that AI-generated code is to blame, citing user error and misconfigured access controls instead. The company has mandated that junior and mid-level engineers require senior sign-off for any AI-assisted code changes. AWS also faced a separate incident in December 2025, where its Kiro AI tool caused a 13-hour outage due to similar issues. Amazon's recent layoffs and push for AI tool usage have raised concerns about the effectiveness of their engineering practices. The situation has prompted a mandatory engineering meeting to address the outages and improve operational protocols.

Key Points: • Amazon's retail site suffered a six-hour outage due to AI-assisted code changes. • The company attributes the issues to user error rather than AI-generated code. • Mandatory senior sign-off for AI-assisted changes has been implemented following the incidents.