Microsoft Accounts are having a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day

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I’m seeing reports all over Twitter that Microsoft Accounts aren’t working right. Logging in to your MS Account online, via Outlook, Xbox, OneDrive, S
[See the full post at: Microsoft Accounts are having a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day]

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Something’s wrong with my account as well – couldn’t log to some app on my W10M Lumia 735. I use it for calling mainly, so just ignored it :).

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I am SO glad I have never used a Microsoft account for logging into Windows. I did set up an Outlook.com account for a group I was in – it was used by the entire group as a shared email address. But other than that, none.

So what happens if, say, my computer dies, and I get another one to replace it? For the original computer, I used a Microsoft account and took the free upgrade from Windows 7 to Windows 10. As I understand it, I can use the same Microsoft account to install Windows 10 on the replacement computer, because it applies my Windows 10 license to the replacement computer. But would I have been able to do that during this episode of problems with Microsoft accounts?

Group "L" (Linux Mint)
with Windows 10 running in a remote session on my file server

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Logging in to Windows shouldn’t be a problem. If the link is down, your log in credentials are compared to whatever is stored on your computer.

As far as transferring a license – or anything else that requires a log in, yep, won’t work.

Everything’s OK now.

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MrJimPhelps

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I’ve never been clear on whether you can use your Microsoft account to get your Windows 10 license activated on a new/different computer. I would have thought it was tied to the hardware.

-Noel

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Link a Microsoft Account to a Windows 10 license
http://www.ghacks.net/2016/08/15/link-microsoft-account-windows-10-license/

Windows 10 Pro 22H2

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I understand that if you log into Windows with a Microsoft account, and do the upgrade from 7 or 8.1 to 10, your Windows 10 license is tied both to the computer and to your Microsoft account. This will allow you to use the license again if the original computer dies.

Group "L" (Linux Mint)
with Windows 10 running in a remote session on my file server

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Windows 10 licence is tied to the hardware. It is called Digital license (or entitlement).
It has nothing to do with your Microsoft (“Hotmail” or “Outlook”) account which is used to sign in to Microsoft services, Cloud, email or to roam some of your settings between computers.

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Noel Carboni

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ch100 wrote:

Windows 10 licence is tied to the hardware. It is called Digital license (or entitlement).
It has nothing to do with your Microsoft (“Hotmail” or “Outlook”) account which is used to sign in to Microsoft services, Cloud, email or to roam some of your settings between computers.

That’s no longer normally true:

Based on Insider feedback, we are also introducing the ability to link your Microsoft account (MSA) to the activation digital license with this Insider Preview build. If you already used an MSA to log in to your activated Windows 10 Home or Pro device, your MSA will be automatically linked. You can use this MSA linked digital license to re-activate your Genuine Windows 10 device by running the Activation troubleshooter, if you run into Activation issues caused by hardware changes.

Announcing Windows 10 Insider Preview Build 14371 for PC

 

Activating Windows 10 after a hardware configuration change

If you made a significant hardware change to your device (such as replacing the motherboard) Windows 10 might no longer be activated. If you’re running Windows 10 (Version 1607) and added your Microsoft account and linked it to the digital license on your device, you can use the Activation troubleshooter to reactivate Windows. For more info, see Using the Activation troubleshooter.

Activation in Windows 10

 

More information about how to enable and make use of this feature in the Feedback Hub at https://aka.ms/of9q2i

 

And it’s recommended by Woody:

Is a Microsoft account necessary to lock in a Windows 10 digital license?

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Mary Jo Foley has a report on this too… Still waiting for answers from MS…

http://www.zdnet.com/article/microsoft-authentication-issue-hits-outlook-skype-onedrive-xbox-users/

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I wouldn’t dream of using a Microsoft account for general Windows operation, but I do have Outlook poll my @live.com eMail box, and I’ve seen several pop-ups this morning that implied it wasn’t able to log on during a send/receive cycle.

Haven’t seen it happen in the past half hour though.

-Noel

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Interesting that this follows hot on the heels of the February meltdown of MS Updates. Think we’ll see any March Patch Tuesday patches form MS Updates?

Even if the updates are back to near-normal now, this latest outage seems to be part of a growing pattern inside Microsoft.

I am still wondering — have they been hacked?

-- rc primak

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lurks about, WildBill, Noel Carboni

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Two months in a row around Patch Tuesday is bit disconcerting. Are they somehow related in some weird way that is not obvious to outsiders?

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If your are call today the traditional “Patch Tuesday”, it is not, that is next week.
If you’re call all Tuesdays as the new MS Patch Tuesday or Patch Thursday or what ever MS chooses to release, Well……

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Actually, it’s A Tuesday, B Tuesday, C Tuesday and D Tuesday (first, second, third fourth)
A Tuesday is Office non-security updates
B Tuesday is Patch Tuesday – Windows, Office security, all the rest
C Tuesday is Preview Tuesday – test non-security patch for Windows
After that, Woody steps in with MS-DEFCON and tells us when it’s safe to install all those patches.

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SueW, walker, lizzytish, ch100

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See @pkcano post for a detailed explanation. Nothing unusual if you read carefully.

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rc primak wrote:

Think we’ll see any March Patch Tuesday patches form MS Updates?

I’ll offer a SWAG that we will. And that they’ll probably break my uptime streak by requiring a reboot.

Then the question that also seems pertinent is this:

Do we look forward to them or dread them?

-Noel

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PhotM

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rc primak wrote:

I am still wondering — have they been hacked?

I have certainly wondered that myself.

-Noel

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I’m wondering that, too, as I had a little trouble logging in to my e-mail this morning. The delayed response time was about 5 minutes from the time I clicked the “Log In” button until it finally opened. I just figured it was the internet being slow. Oh well, it is doing fine now. I hope everyone else is doing well also.

Just my 2 cents worth.

Dave

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That just gives me another reason to do all I can to stop using Microsoft products.  I still use Windows 7 and I have a Hotmail Email account which I couldn’t get into this morning.  I ‘m glad I only use it for people I’m not sure of.

After what they did with get Windows X, trying to force everyone to switch to it and when they stopped supporting Windows Live Mail which I sometimes used I stopped as much as I could using Microsoft products.

When this computer goes and I have to upgrade I will definitely consider Apple.

 

 

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I’ll be doing some updating of my tablet (Win 10 Pro) to day. While I may not need to sign in to my MS Account to get Store Apps updated, I think I’ll try to log in, just to see what happens. I’ll report back as to what happens and what time of day if I get this far today.

-- rc primak

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It is a bit unsettling to think that if they got hacked and they keep some facilities to remotely access your computer and disable things, snoop or whatever else deemed necessary that they reserved the right to do in the EULA for reasonable purpose, maybe you would be more safe using a Windows XP computer behind a good Firewall and a fully patched browser than the much more secure in theory Windows 10.

Imagine now that it would be known to the public and hackers started releasing personal information of random users. That would put a huge dent in the cloud first project at MS.

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Well, as of 3:30 PM Central USA Time, the MS Store Apps are updating as they always have done. And Woody reports (Woody’s post above this one) that MS Updates is delivering patches this month, including MS Office updates and two revised snooping patches. So for better or worse, outside of MS Cloud Accounts, all seems to be near-normal at Microsoft once again. And of course, that meant Woody placed us back on MS DEFCON 2.  The Circle of Life!

-- rc primak

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ch100

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Maybe they had a syntax error in a code?  Malware attack on their server?

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well my Microsoft Account at Outlook.com is working correctly as I signed in to it this Wednesday morning several minutes ago. so things are working on my end of the spectrum.

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The problem is back.

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Noel Carboni

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Yep. I can confirm it.

See https://www.askwoody.com/2017/microsoft-online-services-hit-with-another-outage/

Thanks for the heads-up!

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Yes, seeing it here too.

-Noel

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Snap

Windows - commercial by definition and now function...

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