Microsoft says services still returning amid widespread outage
Microsoft reported improving email and other services more than 24 hours after a mass outage disrupted communications worldwide, affecting users in 74 countries.
The outage began around 16:00 GMT on Thursday and was caused by overloaded servers that became 'unexpectedly available,' according to Microsoft. The tech giant confirmed there was no indication of a cyberattack or malicious activity. 'We're seeing encouraging recovery progress, with service availability and email delivery performance improving across a growing portion of affected infrastructure,' the company stated.
Global Impact
Microsoft 365 services including Outlook, Teams and Copilot were affected, making it one of the longest outages in Microsoft's history. While the company hasn't specified the number of affected users, it has over 450 million Microsoft 365 commercial subscribers and is valued at more than $3.8 trillion.
Sector Disruptions
Foreign banks and financial institutions in Taiwan were particularly affected, with some resorting to fax machines. Norway's parliament and several ministries lost email access, while 80 to 90 Danish municipalities reported issues. Rail operators in Germany, the UK and Canada experienced timetable disruptions, and the UK's National Health Service switched to paper records.
In the United States, the House of Representatives and local governments were affected. The US Department of Defense, which relies heavily on Microsoft services and has a $9.7bn deal for infrastructure upgrades, did not comment on its status. Microsoft's stock remained mostly flat despite the outage as the tech-heavy Nasdaq index fell slightly.
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