Scottish Government activates resilience operations after Microsoft outage

The Scottish Government has activated its resilience operations in the wake of the global Microsoft outage, Justice Secretary Neil Gray confirmed. (Jane Barlow/PA)Katrine Bussey2 minutes agoThe Scottish Government as activated its resilience operations as it seeks to assess the impact of a global Microsoft outage on services.

Justice Secretary Neil Gray said ministers were liaising with key partners – but stresses that the government “remains operational and business continues”.

He spoke out after councils and other public services were hit with technology problems that left millions without access to emails and Teams around the world.

The tech giant said it was working with “urgency ” to find a fix for the issue, which has caused widespread disruption since late Thursday, with governments, banks, police forces and health services among those hit.

Microsoft users across the globe have suffered issues since late on Thursday. (Uii Mok.PA)Mr Gray said: “The Scottish Government’s resilience operation has been activated to assess the main impacts on Scotland of the global outage impacting some of Microsoft’s Cloud Services.”

He added: “We are liaising with partners across public services as they assess the impacts and continue providing key frontline services.

“While this is currently impacting some of the Scottish Government’s corporate systems, including access to emails, the Scottish Government remains operational and business continues.”

Councils and public services in Scotland are among those affected as a result of the ongoing global Microsoft outage.

The problem developed on Thursday evening and with Microsoft saying on Friday that it was “seeing early signs of stabilisation”.

But it cautioned: “Service capacity has not yet returned to normal levels and health remains variable as traffic is carefully reintroduced.”

Police Scotland reported problems with its emails and online forms.

On X, the force said: “Due to the global Microsoft outage, our online forms are affected, including ContactUs.

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“We are unable to receive any emails, and there may be a delay in responding to any forms sent to us in the last 24 hours as this outage continues.”

An NHS Grampian spokesperson said: “NHS Grampian is affected by the Outlook outage this morning which means that staff and services are currently unable to access e-mails.

“Telephone lines and all other systems are working as normal.”

Many of Scotland’s local authorities are experiencing the same problems, and a spokesperson for the City of Edinburgh Council wrote: “Due to a worldwide Microsoft outage, we are unable to send or receive emails at this time, and some of our online forms are not available.

“If you need to get in touch with us, please contact us by telephone.”

East Lothian Council added: “Due to a worldwide Microsoft outage, we are not able to send and receive emails at present.

“If you need to contact the council, please contact us by telephone. Our main number is 01620 827827.

“Any parents/carers should telephone their child’s school if needing to get in touch.”

The Scottish Borders Council said: “Due to a global issue affecting Microsoft we are experiencing issues with various systems, including our emails and some contact forms.

“If you need to reach us urgently please call 0300 100 1800.

“If you need to contact a school urgently, please call rather than email.”