Is there an issue with calls to WolframAlpha from Mathematica?

I was trying to use the step by step to get a solution to an integral, but it was failing, so I tried an even simpler example from the Wolfram documentation

  WolframAlpha["what is the distance to the moon?"]

The output is, with no other detail given

  $Failed

I have also tried an example posted as solution on this site

  WolframAlpha["solve y'[x]+y[x]\[Equal]a Sin[x]",   {{"DifferentialEquationSolution", 2}, "Content"},    PodStates -> {"DifferentialEquationSolution__Step-by-step solution"}]

The result fails with a message

  Missing["NotAvailable"]

I am running MMA V14.0.0.0 on Windows 10, x86.

I am not sure if there is an issue with calling WA inside Mathematica, or my install got corrupted somehow. Any way to tell?

Note: As an aside, even direct calls to WA fail using $=$ or $==$ followed by an input, fail in the same way.