Technical Problems with DOS Passport/Visa System

Notice on the U.S. Department of State website:

Important Notice: The Department of State Bureau of Consular Affairs is currently experiencing technical problems with our passport and visa system. We are operational, but currently issuing documents at a reduced capacity. This issue is worldwide and is not specific to any particular country, citizenship document, or visa category. We apologize to applicants who are experiencing delays or are unable to obtain a passport, Report of Birth Abroad, or visa at this time. We are working urgently to correct the problem and expect our system to be fully operational again soon. Routine passport services are not affected at this time. We will be posting updates to Travel.State.Gov as more information becomes available.

Update from July 31, 2014, at 4pm ET on the U.S. Department of State website:

The CCD is still performing below its normal operational capacity. However, to give you an idea of the progress we have made, from the start of the operational issues on July 20 through July 28, we issued more than 220,000 nonimmigrant visas globally. Based on our average production figures, we would have anticipated issuing closer to 425,000 nonimmigrant visas in that time period, indicating we have been able to print nonimmigrant visas for about half of all approved travelers. It will take some weeks before we are back to normal turnaround times on issued visas. We continue to prioritize immigrant visas, adoption cases, and emergency nonimmigrant visa cases. We are printing visas for these cases with very few delays.