Updated: Hotmail users hit by login glitch

A number of Hotmail users were locked out of their email accounts by a login glitch earlier today.

The problem had been reported by a slew of Hotmail users on social networking site Twitter, who after inputting their username and password claimed to have been either redirected to the login screen again or faced with a blank, white screen.

"Is Hotmail down? I cant access my email on my Android app and the webpage is not available," said @XboxSONJ2012

"Hotmail is down again, just goes to show how out-dated they are and how poor there service is. Switching everything over to Gmail later," added @AshleyLLoyd5.

Microsoft's live status screen confirmed that Hotmail, Messenger and the firm's cloud storage service SkyDrive were experiencing unspecified technical difficulties earlier.

Meanwhile, according to a status report on website uptime monitor Downrightnow.com, Hotmail had been suffering problems since around 11am today.

At the time of writing, the problems appeared to have been fixed.

In a statement to IT Pro, Microsoft said: "Some Microsoft services experienced a short-term issue that caused a small number of customers not to be able to access their accounts.

"We worked quickly to resolve the issue, and service is now restored to normal. We sincerely apologise for any inconvenience this caused our customers."