Microsoft 365 Alert – Service Degradation – Microsoft 365 suite – Some users may have been unable to open Google search links from email and Microsoft Teams messages – RESOLVED

02/09/2026 04:03:00 AM

NHS.net Connect Reference: INC46924547

Microsoft Reference: MO1465962

Issue Status: RESOLVED

Issue Description: Users may have been unable to open Google search links from email and Microsoft Teams messages.

More info: Microsoft Defender for Office 365 Safe Links may have blocked the opening of Google search links (URLs), identifying them as malicious. In addition, admins may have received related alerts and incidents in the Microsoft Defender portal and Microsoft Sentinel as a result of these detections. Affected users received the following message when attempting to open the Google search links:

“Opening this website might not be safe”

Copying the hyperlink and pasting it directly into a browser didn’t bypass the warning.

Final Update: 02/09/2026 04:04:00 AM –Microsoft has received confirmation that the issue has been successfully resolved. However, some users may continue to experience impact for a limited time while the mitigation propagates through the service infrastructure.

Scope of impact: Some users attempting to open Google search links from email and Microsoft Teams messages may have been impacted.

Root cause: An inaccurate security classification caused legitimate Google search URLs to be incorrectly identified as malicious, resulting in Microsoft Defender for Office 365 Safe Links blocking access to affected links.

Next steps: Microsoft is reviewing their URL reputation classification processes to help prevent similar false-positives in the future.