Facebook Closed Feb. 29-30-31?

Claim:   Facebook will be closed for maintenance on Feb. 29, 30, and 31.

FALSE

Examples:  

[Collected via e-mail, January 2013]

I've seen a few times on Facebook, a post that Facebook will be closed down Feb 29,30, & 31st? I'm sure its a hoax but not 100% here it is:

 

---

[Collected via e-mail, February 2012]

Saw this rumor in a friends facebook status. Is this true?

Facebook will be closed for maintenance from Feb. 29-31. Many people will try to login from February 29 to 31, only to find the site closed. Please repost so that your FB friends have warning and do not face mental health problems due to FB withdrawal. I will be placing my brain in a vault for those three days. My FB friends let me know (thank you Carolyn!). I am passing it forward

Origins:   For as long as the Internet has been in common use, pranksters have spread hoax messages proclaiming that

some popular service (such as Facebook), or the Internet as a whole, will be shutting down, either permanently or for temporary maintenance, on a particular date. Much as we dislike having to spoil a joke by explaining its punchline, we'll go on record as noting that this item about Facebook's closing for maintenance during the last three days of February is just a bit of frivolity in that same vein.

The message reproduced above, proclaiming that Facebook will be "closed for maintenance" from Feb. 29-31, is a double-whammy prank: not only is the notion that Facebook will be shutting down in order to perform "maintenance" a hoax, but the dates cited for that shutdown — Feb. 29, 30, and 31 — are non-existent, as the month of February never includes more than 29 days and has only 28 days in non-leap years such as 2015.

Last updated:   28 January 2015