Microsoft Outage Disrupts London Police Online Crime Reporting

A significant global outage affecting Microsoft services has disrupted operations across London, including the ability for residents to submit online crime reports. The failure, which began late on Thursday, has impacted essential services such as emails and Microsoft Teams, leading police forces to urge the public to use telephone lines for any urgent reports.

Impact on Public Services

The widespread technical issue has affected governments, banks, police forces, and health services. In London, this meant that online portals for reporting crimes were inaccessible. Police have directed individuals needing to report incidents to call the non-emergency number 101 or, for immediate threats, the emergency number 999. The National Pharmacy Association also indicated potential delays for NHS patients receiving prescriptions due to the disruption to NHS email systems.

Monitoring website Downdetector registered a sharp increase in reports of Microsoft Teams issues in the UK around 6:15 pm on Thursday. Globally, over 130,000 users in the US reported Outlook problems at the peak of the disruption. Microsoft's 365 status page indicated that while early signs of stabilisation were being observed, service capacity had not fully returned to normal levels.

Cause of the Outage

Microsoft executive vice-president Charles Lamanna stated that the outages did not appear to be the result of a cyber attack. The technology giant confirmed it was working with urgency to resolve the problem, noting that initial fixes were not performing as expected. The company extended email timeout windows to 48 hours to help protect delayed messages during the recovery process. Microsoft has committed to sharing a full post-incident report after services are restored.

Users from numerous countries, including the UK, US, India, and New Zealand, reported issues with Microsoft services throughout Thursday and into Friday, primarily affecting European and Asian regions. Courts, charities, and banks worldwide have also reported experiencing these outages.