Microsoft reported it was investigating a networking issue that had caused disruption for several of its services, including Teams and Outlook. Outage reports estimated the platforms were inaccessible for thousands of users across the globe. 

Impact on users not yet known

Microsoft did not comment on the number of users impacted by the breakdown, but did confirm the network infrastructure was disrupted worldwide. A solution was being worked on, according to the company's website.

"We've identified a potential networking issue and are reviewing telemetry to determine the next troubleshooting steps," Microsoft said in a tweet. 

"We've determined the network connectivity issue is occurring with devices across the Microsoft Wide Area Network (WAN)," Microsoft said. This impacts connectivity between clients on the internet to its cloud platform Azure, as well as connectivity between services in datacenters, it said.

Microsoft added in a tweet it had rolled back a network change that it believed was causing the issue. "We're monitoring the service as the rollback takes effect," it said.

During the outage, a majority of users were unable to send messages, join calls or use any features of the Teams application. #MicrosoftTeams was trending on Twitter as users took to the social media site to exchange experiences about the service disruption. 

Who was affected? 

Outage tracking website Downdetecter estimated more than 3,900 incidents in India and over 900 in Japan. Other outage reports spiked in Australia, the United Kingdom and the United Arab Emirates. 

Azure's status page showed services were impacted in Americas, Europe, Asia Pacific, Middle East and Africa. Services in China were not impacted. 

Microsoft Teams is used by more than 280 million people worldwide. It forms an integral part of daily operations for businesses and schools, which use the application to schedule meetings and calls or organize their workflow. 

los/kb (dpa, AFP, Reuters, AP)