Tech titan Microsoft is welcoming in Q1 of 2025 by implementing new job cuts across a number of divisions in its business.
Targeting employees across gaming, experience and devices, sales, and security, the news of job losses comes hot off another Microsoft announcement of separate and unrelated performance-related job cuts across its business.
Business Insider reported that a Microsoft spokesperson said the layoffs would affect a small number of employees without specifying exact numbers.
Examining the Layoffs
Affected employees started receiving notifications on Tuesday about layoffs in Microsoft's security unit.
Although the company does not publicly disclose the breakdown of employees across specific divisions like security, Microsoft's overall global workforce floats at around 228,000 employees.
Microsoft security is twofold: it creates enterprise security tools such as Microsoft Defender for Endpoint and Microsoft Sentinel whilst also maintaining Microsoft's own security.
The cut has not been specified as to where it will land. Yet, the announcement is surprising, seeing as how only last year the company expanded its Secure Future Initiative, making security the "top priority" for every employee.
"If you're faced with the tradeoff between security and another priority, your answer is clear: Do security,"
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella told employees in an email last year.
Contextualising the Development
Microsoft's focus on security came from what the US Department of Homeland Security called "a cascade of security failures".
It stated, "Microsoft's security culture was inadequate and requires an overhaul", given the company's ubiquity and role in the world's technology ecosystem.
This damning indictment resulted from a 2023 hack, where an alleged Chinese hacking group breached Microsoft Exchange Online email and stole thousands of US government emails.
Equally, In 2024, Russian hackers broke into Microsoft's systems, spied on staff inboxes and stole emails from its customers.
Days after millions of Windows PCs went down across the world due to a bug Microsoft systems experienced with the Crowdstrike update, its services like Microsoft 365 and Microsoft Teams were taken offline by a Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack. Microsoft said in an update its attempts to stop the DDoS attack actually amplified it.
So bad were the recent failings that Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella took a voluntary pay cut of $5 million over the company's cyber failures
How Security Could Take a Hit
Although its productivity and business process offerings are not affected, the knock-on effects of these layoffs could begin to hit Microsoft's main meal ticket.
The fact that the security segment of its division is subject to layoff and performance-related cuts could see a chunk of its workforce reduced.
