Microsoft apologises for global outage caused by technical issue
The tech giant said the disruption to Outlook and Teams was due to a network capacity upgrade and not a cyberattack.
Microsoft has expressed that it is "deeply sorry" for a global service outage that disrupted products including Outlook, Teams, and Copilot AI software for nearly 24 hours. According to reports from BBC News, WION, and India Today, the disruption affected more than 70 countries and impacted over 430 million users worldwide.
The company stated the outage was caused by a technical issue introduced during a network capacity upgrade and was not related to cyberattacks or artificial intelligence agents. Microsoft noted that the issue surfaced following a recent network change. The company is restoring services gradually to ensure stability, though it has no estimated time for full recovery.
In India, the outage affected aviation services, with IndiGo and Akasa Air reporting delays in email support. Air India stated its flight operations remained unaffected and temporarily rerouted email services. Users in India began reporting problems around 11 pm on Thursday, with reports rising again after 6 am on Friday.
The disruption impacted various global institutions, including the Japanese government, the Philippines Supreme Court, and parts of the NHS in the UK. In the US, staff from the House of Representatives said the outage set back a day of legislative work. Microsoft has extended the email timeout to 48 hours to help preserve delayed mail.
Microsoft said it is seeing broad recovery and stability across its services, with improvements noted in North America, Europe, and the Asia-Pacific region. A full post-incident report will be released once the company completes its review.