HMRC issues urgent Microsoft alert – ‘stop and think’

HMRC has warned customers to watch for scam calls posing as Microsoft after a global outage disrupted Microsoft services. The alert matters because fraudsters are using the disruption to seek HMRC usernames and passwords.

The outage affected Outlook, Teams, OneDrive and Copilot in more than 70 countries on Friday 13 November. Microsoft attributed it to a configuration error during a network capacity upgrade and ruled out a cyberattack. HMRC says it will never ask for sign-in or personal details by phone, text or email, and advises people to stop, check whether a request is genuine and report suspicious contact.