Microsoft reports gradual recovery after massive Outlook outage

After the Outlook outage on Monday that lasted several hours, Microsoft has now reported a gradual recovery. The company said that it is investigating the service interruption that disrupted email and Calendar functions, affecting users mainly in North America. “We’ve applied mitigation across the affected infrastructure and monitoring the service to ensure a full recovery. Additionally, we’re taking additional steps to expedite the recovery process,” the company said. 

During the outage, users were unable to send, receive, or search emails since late Monday; at least 2000 incidents were reported, as per online tracker Downdetector. The company’s Twitter handle tweeted that a ‘recent change’ was the cause behind the outage, however, it did not elaborate further. As per the online tracker Downdetector, the outage started after E.T. 10:30 PM on Monday (IST 9 AM on Tuesday). 

We’ve confirmed that a recent change is contributing to the cause of impact. We’re working on potential solutions to restore availability of the service. Refer to EX512238 or https://t.co/nEuSQarMf3 for more detailed information.

— Microsoft 365 Status (@MSFT365Status) February 7, 2023

Later, in an update, the company said on Tuesday morning that users outside North America may experience a ‘residual impact’ due to the affected portions of the infrastructure.  

This is the second occurrence in recent weeks. Last month, several Microsoft services like MS Teams, Outlook, and Microsoft 365 were down for users around the world. Most of the outages were reported from India (3,900 incidents) and Japan (900 incidents). Due to this, many Microsoft users were unable to send and receive messages, join calls, and use any application feature. It was revealed that the outage, which also affected Azure and LinkedIn, was due to a change made to Microsoft’s wide area network (WAN).