Virgin Media has suffered a technical glitch which has left many customers unable to access Facebook or Instagram.

The broadband provider has confirmed in response to customer complaints that it is experiencing "DNS issues".

This refers to the Domain Name Server, the technology that links website addresses to corresponding servers, connecting users to the site.

As a result, thousands of users have been unable to access the social networks.

According to web monitoring website downdetector.co.uk, users in London, Birmingham, Nottingham and Bristol have been among those unable to access Facebook as a result of the issue.

The broadband provider has more than five million customers in the UK.

Virgin Media is yet to comment further on the issue.