Microsoft apologizes for global outage affecting services in 74 countries

Outage impacts healthcare and airlines

The disruption began on Thursday and knocked out Microsoft products in the Americas, Europe, Asia and Africa. Health care staff at the UK National Health Service could not refer patient details normally, creating a massive backlog. Rachel Harrison, public services head at the GMB union, stated this had a serious impact on the country's health service. Airlines in India warned that customer queries might not get through as email support failed. IndiGo and Akasa Air confirmed their email services were affected during the incident.

Immigration and finance sectors hit

Immigration New Zealand said the disruption forced a halt in processing all visa applications immediately. Corporate earnings reports faced delays while schools struggled to communicate with students and parents. In London's financial district, workers noted their dependence on Copilot, Microsoft's AI assistant, was exposed by the event. Japan's economy and trade industry minister Ryosei Akazawa warned of significant impacts because many people use these products daily.

Recovery status and company response

Microsoft reported a broad recovery for Outlook email and other services on Friday morning. Officials from the firm announced that complete service restoration continued following an outage which began earlier today. Officials ruled out any malicious cyber or AI activity as the cause of the technical issue. Microsoft expressed deep sorrow for the disruption caused to customers and partners globally during this incident.