Microsoft and email, shut out of my account

[t8hants]

I tried to get at my hotmail account this morning, only to be confronted with what appeared to be the latest demand by MS to upgrade to their newest all singing and dancing version with lots of advantages for the iphone wot I ain't not got. Trying to by-pass it by just signing in, I had to put in my password, which I can't remember, or use a different email address to get a security code, which I then got. When that was entered a list of questions including full postal address, DoB, etc, were required so that was the point at which I bailed out. Is this legit or a very well put together scam? I fail to see why they need my address and DoB for an email account, or is this the latest piece of legislation being a P in the A?

 

[Terry - Somerset]

I would try accessing your account from another computer using a different router. This may clarify whether it is a general microsoft action, or whether you have picked up some kind of bug.

 

[Argus]

I have an idea - may be wrong - that Hotmail is/was being superseded? Not available to new accounts?
Their latest version is 'outlook'........ I think
I have an outlook account that I keep for Schatzenschizen and suspect stuff, but it is working fine, so I'd go with Terry's idea as a first check.

 

[billw]

Microsoft do have stringent security for allowing access to an account, so it's probably legit. Check the URL in the browser bar and the associated security credentials.

 

[t8hants]

I went on to the Hotmail account again and thought I would do the upgrade to the new version of Outlook as Hotmail seems to be being killed off. After completing the registration process and using a virgin password, it looked lie I was going to end up where I wanted to be, but at the very last step instead of of going to an email acc I was taken to something called 'pricezoom' which was just a sales site, with no link to outlook. What I found confusing was the address of all this was microsoft . com (no spaces) plus a / and a few letters, so I still don't know if it is a MS site or a very impressive hack.

 

[MikeK]

The link I use for Outlook is:

https://outlook.live.com/owa

 

[t8hants]

That worked, I have now revived a long dead outlook account I last used in 2017, via that link. Think I will try and and retrieve the others tomorrow. I would like to reuse my old OE email system I knew that backewards, but that was taken down with my old fsnet address and try as I might I can't get OE to change email addresses.