Microsoft Outages Persist as Recovery Efforts Continue

Microsoft users around the world faced continued disruption on Friday as the tech giant worked to resolve a global outage impacting Microsoft 365 service connectivity.

At around 6.15pm on Thursday, tracking site Downdetector initially registered a surge in complaints from users experiencing difficulties with Microsoft Teams in the UK and Ireland. The disruption affected access to email, Teams, Copilot, and other cloud services across 74 countries and territories.

If you're having trouble accessing some Microsoft services like Outlook, OneDrive, or Copilot … yeah, a thing is going ATM.https://t.co/uyxit6UcWG

— Post by @WindowsCentral on X

Servers brought back online became unresponsive again once they started receiving traffic, the company stated on X. Engineers tested several solutions, including isolating parts of infrastructure and shifting traffic to alternate routes.

“We appreciate your organisation’s patience and understanding while we work with urgency to resolve this incident,” the company said.

We're investigating reports of users experiencing issues accessing Exchange Online mailboxes through multiple connection methods in the Americas. More details can be found in the Microsoft 365 admin center under EX1550543.

— Post by @MSFT365Status on X

International Public Services Affected

The technical failure halted operations for government departments and public agencies overseas. In Australia, Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke confirmed that the disruption hit email systems, while the country’s domestic intelligence agency and police also reported impacts.

Japan’s Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Masanao Ozaki said that the outage affected government IT infrastructure. New Zealand’s immigration authority paused the processing of all visa applications until further notice because customers could not apply through its enhanced online platform.

Microsoft Outlook is down. Microsoft 365 issues are cutting people off from their email, as well as Microsoft Teams, SharePoint Online, and Microsoft 365 Copilot https://t.co/4odaKBRKQS

— Post by @tomwarren on X

“Immigration New Zealand has paused the processing of all visa applications until further notice because of the global Microsoft outage,” the agency said.

Cyber Attack Concerns Dismissed

Microsoft executive vice-president Charles Lamanna confirmed that the incident did not stem from a cyber attack.

“As of now, we are not aware of any malicious activity that is causing this incident, and we will continue to treat this incident with urgency and priority until full resolution,” Microsoft said.

OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, also reported connector issues that left new connections broken and tools malfunctioning. The company stated it was investigating problems with Microsoft connectors.

Server Stability Actions Implemented

Microsoft adjusted how traffic moved through its systems and temporarily blocked some traffic to help stabilise services. The company reported partial recovery in some regions following these updates.

“We’re seeing positive results for service stability and increased capacity as a result of our latest traffic optimization actions,” Microsoft said in an update.

Engineers continued implementing those actions more broadly across affected regions. Work to restore affected infrastructure persisted through Friday morning.

Questions About Microsoft Outages

Which Microsoft products were impacted by the outage?

The disruption impacted the Copilot AI tool, the Teams messaging platform, Outlook email, along with certain elements of the company’s Cloud infrastructure.

How many countries experienced disruptions?

Outage tracker Downdetector reported that Microsoft products were hit across 74 countries and territories globally.

What caused the servers to keep crashing after restart?

Microsoft explained that servers returned to service became unresponsive again once they received traffic.