Hotmail...?

For the last several months, but rarely prior to that, I've experienced periods when I'm not able to log in to my Hotmail account, getting the error message that there've been too many attempts to log in with the incorrect password. I wait 24 hours, then 48 hours, but still can't log in. Using my backup email for a code gets me in, using the url login.live.com instead of hotmail.com has sometimes gotten me in, but this is still annoying. Then after a couple of weeks, I can log in again normally with my regular password. Is MS really detecting someone trying to hack my account, or is this a software issue. Has anyone else experienced this?

And a related question... When I'm finally able to get into hotmail using my backup email, MS prompts me to enter my phone number as an extra backup, but when I enter my phone number, it tells me "Something went wrong" and doesn't add it to my account. I've tried with and without dashes. Help...