Skype, the globally popular video chat service, is down this morning for many users, according to the company.

Users of the video and voice chat service reported to the company that they were unable to sign on. Skype said they have identified the problem and are fixing it currently.

Some of you may have problems signing in to Skype and making calls. We're investigating and hope to have more details to share soon, the company tweeted first. It then followed with, Thanks for your patience - we've identified the problem and will be rolling out a fix soon.

In the mean time, Skype has offered its users a manual fix. The fix is below.

This is not the first time Skype has experienced major outages. Back in December, the company had widespread outages, which were fixed over the period of a day.

Skype was recently bought by Microsoft for $8 billion. The two companies will merge together, and Skype will become a division within Microsoft. The popular service had 170 million connected users and logged over 207 billion minutes of voice and video conversations in 2010.

Windows Vista and Windows 7:

1. Close Skype.
1a. Right-click the Skype icon in the system tray (at the bottom right of the screen)
1b. Choose Quit.
2. Ensure that Show hidden files and folders is switched on.
2a. Click Start, type run and press Enter.
2b. Type control folders and click OK.
c. Select the View tab and ensure relevant entry is enabled.
3. Locate the shared.xml file.
3a. Click Start, type run and press Enter.
3b. Type %appdata%skype and click OK.
3c. Delete the shared.xml file.
4. Restart Skype. The shared.xml file will be recreated.

Windows XP:1. Close Skype.
1a. Right-click the Skype icon in the system tray (at the bottom right of the screen)
1b. Choose Quit.
2. Ensure that Show hidden files and folders is switched on.
2a. Click Start and then Run...
2b. Type control folders and click OK.
2c. Select the View tab and ensure relevant entry is enabled.
3. Locate the shared.xml file.
3a. Click Start and then Run...
b. Type %appdata%skype and click OK.
c. Delete the shared.xml file.
4. Restart Skype. The shared.xml file will be recreated.

Mac OS X:

1. Quit Skype.
2. Go to the folder ~/Library/Application Support/Skype/
3. Delete the file shared.xml (it will be recreated once you open Skype again, this is fine).
4. Start Skype.

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