– A global Microsoft Azure outage on Tuesday was caused by a distributed denial of service cyberattack
– The attack impacted services including Outlook emails and Starbucks’ mobile app
– An error in the platform’s defense response may have amplified the impact of the attack
– The outage lasted nearly eight hours, affecting select Azure, Microsoft 365, and Purview customers
– Outage reports were scattered, with some companies experiencing user complaints in the hundreds or low thousands
– Some impacted services were restored in a matter of hours, including Starbucks’ mobile order and pay feature
– Microsoft plans to publish a preliminary post-incident report within 72 hours
– This outage follows a recent disruption caused by a faulty software update by cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike
– Microsoft has faced criticism for cybersecurity practices, with a federal cybersecurity review board alleging inadequate security culture and practices