Microsoft Azure Outage Disrupts Global Cloud Services

On October 29th, 2025, a significant outage in Microsoft's Azure cloud platform has caused widespread disruption to internet services around the world. According to a senior Scottish Parliament source, the problems are directly related to the Microsoft Azure network infrastructure, which was showing a "critical" status in every region globally.

While the exact scope of the impact is unclear, industry experts estimate that Microsoft Azure accounts for around 20% of the global cloud market. The outage has effectively "crippled hundreds, if not thousands of applications and systems" that rely on Azure's cloud services, as explained by Dr. Saqib Kakvi from Royal Holloway University.

Microsoft has acknowledged the issue, stating that the outage was the result of "an inadvertent configuration change" made behind the scenes. The company is now working to fix the problem by replacing the affected Azure services with a recent backup that was known to be functioning properly. However, Microsoft could not provide a timeline for when the issue would be fully resolved.

The concentration of cloud infrastructure in the hands of a few major players like Microsoft, Amazon, and Google means that an outage of this magnitude can have far-reaching consequences. As Dr. Kakvi noted, "it is effectively putting all our eggs in one of three baskets," highlighting the need for greater diversification and resilience in the cloud computing industry.