Microsoft outage enters second day as global email and court systems struggle

A widespread failure of Microsoft 365 services has left millions of workers without email, video conferencing, and AI tools as the disruption entered its second day on Friday, November 13. The outage, which began 18 hours earlier on Thursday, has affected Outlook, Teams, and the Copilot assistant, causing delays in business communications, legal proceedings, and government operations across three continents. Microsoft stated it is making headway in restoring services, with updates posted on social media indicating that service availability and email delivery are improving across a growing portion of its infrastructure.

The company reported specific gains in certain regions, noting broader improvements in North America and sustained progress across much of Europe. In the Asia-Pacific region, engineers observed encouraging recovery signals, though Microsoft warned that some users might still experience intermittent access issues or delayed email delivery as mitigation efforts continue on remaining affected infrastructure. The total number of people affected is not public, but the company reported in January that it holds more than 450 million paid Microsoft 365 commercial subscriptions.

Microsoft engineers are using a measured approach to identify and repair the affected infrastructure, with no indication that the outage was caused by malicious activity. The company stated it would treat the incident with urgency and priority until full resolution is reached. A series of 20 posts on X showed the team working through the problem, with one update admitting that changes were not taking as expected. By Friday morning, the company reported early stabilization and capacity improvements, focusing its efforts on reducing the email queue and backlog in the remaining affected environments.

The disruption forced a halt to a trial in Manchester, England, where Judge Maurice Greene sent jurors home due to delays caused by the technical failure. The British government said it is working closely with Microsoft to assess the impact on public services, while police forces urged the public to call emergency responders for urgent reports because online crime reporting systems were down. The National Pharmacy Association warned that prescription delays could occur because the outage is affecting the email systems of the state-run National Health Service.

In Asia, the impact extended to both government and private sectors. Australia's Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke said Microsoft compared the current disruption to the 2024 CrowdStrike outage, which was caused by a faulty update. Burke told reporters in Sydney that Microsoft believes it is dealing with an update that has gone awry rather than a cyberattack. In Hong Kong, Danny Lau, who runs an aluminum firm, said his company could not receive updates from U.S. customers, potentially impacting his production timeline. Some local banks also saw part of their operations disrupted.

Air travel in India was largely unaffected, though airlines managed the communications fallout. Air India said it temporarily rerouted its email services to ensure customer queries reached the airline, while IndiGo reported disruptions to its email support services but confirmed its flight operations remained intact. In Singapore, the Government Technology Agency confirmed that government emails were down and that it was working with Microsoft to resolve the issue. The Philippines Supreme Court also stated that the outage affected some of its operations, including email responses.

Japanese officials said the government's IT infrastructure was affected, and Deputy Chief Cabinet Secretary Masanao Ozaki noted that authorities were keeping a close eye on the developments. The government took steps to secure alternative communication tools, including telephones. In the United States, Workhorse Group Inc. delayed a conference call for its quarterly earnings because of the outage. Meanwhile, AI companies OpenAI and Anthropic reported problems connecting with Microsoft 365 tools, showing how the disruption affected platforms that rely on other companies' software.