Tuesday’s global outage of Microsoft Azure, which affected a wide range of consumer services from reports of Outlook email delays to problems ordering on Starbucks’ mobile app, was caused by a distributed denial-of-service (DoS) cyberattack, the company said.
Microsoft Azure is a cloud computing platform used by businesses and organizations around the world. Status Updates It said errors in the platform’s defensive response may have “amplified the impact” of the initial attack rather than mitigating it.
As a result, some Azure, Microsoft 365 and Purview customers experienced temporary outages. The connectivity issues for a “subset” of Microsoft services began around 7:45 a.m. ET on Tuesday and lasted for about eight hours, according to the company’s latest update.
“We apologize for the inconvenience” Azure Support I have written The post was made on social media platform X on Wednesday morning.
Reports of outages on Tuesday were somewhat scattered — a handful of companies and services received hundreds or even thousands of user complaints on issue-tracking site Downdetector — but the scope of the issues appeared to be widespread.
The issues were reported by Minecraft video game players and a Dutch football club. FC Twentethe UK Government HM Courts and Tribunals Service Many people say they found workarounds or had their services restored within a few hours.
Starbucks spokeswoman Jaci Anderson told The Associated Press that some affected customers “temporarily lost access to the mobile ordering and payment features of the Starbucks app due to a third-party systems outage” on Tuesday, but that service had been largely restored by early afternoon.
The Associated Press reached out to Microsoft on Wednesday for more details about the incident and its impact. According to an Azure status report, the company plans to release a preliminary post-incident report within 72 hours.
Tuesday’s Azure troubles came less than two weeks after a flawed software update by a cybersecurity firm disrupted millions of Windows-based computers around the world. Crowdstrike.
Microsoft itself has already come under scrutiny for its cybersecurity practices. In April, the Federal Cybersecurity Review Board The report was issued It claims a “series of mistakes” by the Redmond, Washington-based tech giant allowed government-backed Chinese cyber attackers to break into the email accounts of senior U.S. officials.
The report states: Lax cybersecurity practices, a sloppy corporate culture, and a lack of candor about the company’s knowledge of a targeted breach that affected multiple U.S. government agencies that do business with China.
Given the company’s ubiquity and critical role in the global technology ecosystem, the report concluded that “Microsoft’s security culture is inadequate and in need of a complete overhaul.”
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella reiterated during the company’s earnings call on Tuesday that cybersecurity is the company’s top priority.
