The major issue has impacted or completely disabled many functions, including emails and artificial intelligence products

SCHOOLS, businesses and a number of civil service functions have been impacted by the ongoing global Microsoft outage.

The major issue has impacted or completely disabled many functions, including emails and artificial intelligence products.

According to Microsoft the outage was not caused by a cyber-security incident, but efforts to fix the problem been largely unsuccessful at present.

The Northern Ireland Education Authority says its systems and school systems have been impacted.

In a statement this morning the EA said, “Due to a global Microsoft outage, Outlook is currently unavailable to NI schools and the Education Authority.

“Emails cannot currently be sent or received.

“Microsoft is working to resolve the issue, and further updates will be provided throughout the day.”

The Northern Ireland Housing Executive has also been impacted.

A spokesperson said, “ We are currently experiencing disruption to a number of Microsoft serivces and are unable to send or receive emails. All other services continue to operate as normal. If you have an urgent enquiry, please contact us by telephone on 03448 920 900 .”

Among local businesses impacted is Armagh Sports and Trophies. They said, “ As Microsoft are experiencing global outages worldwide today we are having difficulty reading and replying to customers emails.

“Any queries can be sent to our facebook or instagram messages and we should be able to reply .”

The issue began late on Thursday afternoon (November 12).

Microsoft 365 Services, including Teams, Outlook and its artificial intelligence software Copilot, have been affected by what was described as "connectivity problems".

Many customers have been unable to send or receive emails, view certain files or see details on calendar apps.

According to the Microsoft website more than 430 million people use Microsoft 365 apps.