Fix implemented for Outlook and Teams leading to ‘incremental recovery’

On November 26, 2024By Littum

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Microsoft has implemented a fix to restore email and calendar services to thousands of users who reported outages, leading to “incremental recovery” starting Monday night — but when the programs will fully come back online remains unclear.

The Microsoft Teams logo.

NurPhoto via Getty Images

Key facts

More than 5,300 people had reported problems with Microsoft 365 on the site Down detector from 12 EST Monday – although reports fell below 500 at 18 – with 85% of reports from problems with Outlook, 9% with Exchange and 6% with Sharepoint.

The company said most users had problems accessing Exchange Online – a cloud-based email server – and Microsoft Teams calendars.

Microsoft said it had started implementing a fix from 9 a.m. — shortly after reports of problems began to increase significantly — which includes “manual reboots on a subset of machines that are in an unhealthy state,” but did not provide an estimated time for full recovery.

The fix arrived about 98% of customers from late Monday morning, but the company said later on X its efforts to restart machines “proceeded slower than expected for most affected users.”

Around 18, Microsoft said its staff “continues to see gradual recovery for some users.”

The company added that a “recent change” was likely responsible for the outage, and the change has been reverted.

Although Microsoft did not specify which change affected programs, Monday morning was as well rollout of a new Recall AI tool for Windows Insiders designed to take regular snapshots of computing activity—essentially a “photographic memory” for computers—to store on PCs and make searchable later without remembering exact keywords or dates.

The feature first debuted in May, but its initial version was criticized for privacy and security issues, leading to the full launch being delayed.

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big number

320 million. That’s how many people use Microsoft Teams monthly, according to the company.

Key background

Outlook and Teams are part of Microsoft 365, the family of software and cloud-based services used by millions of businesses worldwide. Microsoft Teams is a collaboration software for chat, scheduling and video calling between employees.

Forbes valuation

Microsoft is listed as no. 8 on Forbes’ index of the world’s most valuable companies. The company, founded by Bill Gates and Paul Allen in 1975, hit a $3 trillion valuation in January, the second-best company to do so. Shares were trading just above $415 on Monday morning — down about 0.3%, despite a nearly 0.5% gain for the tech-heavy Nasdaq. Gates is the 15th richest person in the world with an estimated net worth of $106.5 billion.

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Key facts

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Key background

Forbes valuation

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