In a strange development, the Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited (PTCL) announced on Wednesday that Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, and other Meta services will experience slow performance for 36 hours starting after midnight on December 11.

The company stated in a customer advisory that due to maintenance activity from 1am on Thursday till 1pm on Friday, Meta services will face degradation as engineers carry out planned technical upgrades.

Meanwhile, an official representing PTCL said that, as the country’s key internet and backend service provider, the company has received user complaints about slower performance or intermittent outages of these services.

Meta has not provided any details regarding the nature of the maintenance or whether it would affect all regions uniformly.

The ‘Meta AI’ tool has disowned any maintenance notice and information regarding service degradation on Facebook, Instagram or other Meta services.

It added, “Meta (formerly Facebook) does perform scheduled maintenance, but check official Meta or Facebook Business channels for confirmation of specific dates and details”.

Incidentally, regarding the notice circulating on social media, ‘Meta AI’ said that it resembled a common tactic in phishing or scam messages that try to appear official.

The AI tool suggested looking for the announcement on Meta’s official status page or news releases, and be cautious about SMS instructions unrelated to the maintenance notice itself, especially those asking to text specific numbers to block messages.

Meta has said that maintenance is routinely conducted and such activities are needed to update backend systems, enhance security layers and improve service efficiency.