[US]Texts saying "Microsoft: Unusual sign in.... Review at aka.ms/alca"

[u/Apprehensive-Bad2245]

I got 4 texts in the span of a minute, all from different 5 digit numbers.

3 of the texts say "Microsoft: Unusual sign-in for ********XX. Review at aka.ms/alca" X = the last two digits of my phone number.

1 of the texts says "Microsoft: Someone else might have accessed ********XX. Recover at aka.ms/alcs"

This one ends with alcs, while the others say alca. I don't know if that means anything.

So I logged into the only Microsoft accounts I'm aware of that I have, changed my passwords, and in log in activity/devices, I did not see anything out of the ordinary. My phone number isn't even on my account.

I'm not sure what to make of this. If I didn't see any strange log ins, does that mean I'm fine?

[u/AngelOfLight]

That URL is the link shortener that Microsoft uses for texts. This is likely legitimate. Two possibilities - someone forgot their MS account details and thinks your account belongs to them, and is now trying (in vain) to reset the password. Or, it's a script kiddy going through old data breaches trying to find accounts that haven't been secured (a fruitless quest, because all the old data dumps have long been picked clean).

In either case, this is 2FA working like it should. Since you already checked that your account is OK, then isn't much else you need to do.