Always Cloud, Always Microsoft 365, ...
Microsoft Entra ID provides Managed Conditional Access Policies to help organizations enforce security best practices. These pre-configured policies simplify implementation while ensuring key protections like multifactor authentication (MFA) and blocking legacy authentication. They will be extended in February 2025 and after a 45 trial period automatically activated:
The Cumulative Update 15 (CU15, 2025 H1) for Exchange Server 2019 is now available. This is the final CU for Exchange Server 2019 and brings several enhancements and fixes for known issues. CU15 also includes support for Windows Server 2025, allowing organizations to deploy Exchange Server 2019 on the latest server platform.
What's new in the Exchange Powershell Module, and what are the reasons?
ExchangeOnlineManagement 3.7.0 brings several updates and enhancements to the Exchange Online PowerShell module. This release introduces new features like extended message trace history, optional help file loading, and improvements to inbound IPv6 support. Additionally, Microsoft has updated the timeline for external recipient rate limits and introduced new cmdlets for managing these changes.
The New Outlook for Windows is here, delivering a seamless, productive, and familiar experience for commercial customers. This version integrates advanced productivity features and the latest innovations. Microsoft has planned a migration process (staged rollout) to ensure a predictable transition, with an opt-out option available for those not ready to switch. Early adopters can benefit from a 10–20% reduction in Outlook incidents, making this transition a win for reliability and efficiency.
I am happy to refer to the release of Maester v1 1, a significant update that brings a bunch of new features and improvements. Since the release in March, the community has been working to build up the functionality and stability of Maester. This update includes a substantial increase in the number of tests, growing from 96 to 194, ensuring a wider usability.
Voice isolation, now available on both MacOS and Windows, uses AI to remove background noise, focusing primary on your voice for clear calls and meetings—wherever you are. This AI-powered enhancement focuses on your voice, ensuring only your speech is transmitted, even in busy or noisy environments.
As cyberattacks grow more frequent, protecting your infrastructure more important than ever. A key part is the enforcement of mandatory multifactor authentication (MFA) for all Azure sign-ins. MFA adds an essential layer of protection to your data, blocking over 99% of account compromise attempts.
Starting October 16, 2024, Microsoft will enable IPv6 for all customer Accepted Domains using Exchange Online. This upgrade offers improved security, scalability, and performance by utilizing IPv6.
Organizations need to update their network allow-lists (Firewall) to permit Exchange Online IPv6 endpoints and modify any IP-based inbound connectors referencing IPv4 (Connector, Rules). It is possible to stay with IPv4-only traffic, domains can be opted out over a PowerShell cmdlet. After October 16, if no preference is set, IPv6 will be enabled by default, potentially affecting inbound email traffic.
Microsoft is going to retire Audit Log cmdlets from the 'Exchange Online PowerShell' module starting from September 2024. Instead, they recommend using the Unified Audit Log (UAL) for auditing.
Search-AdminAuditLog and New-AdminAuditLog (New-AdminAuditLogSearch), will retire on September 15, 2024. It's recommended to use Search-UnifiedAuditLog instead.Since June 2024, a new option has become available for transitioning legacy PowerShell scripts away from the deprecated AzureAD module. Below are examples and thoughts on which option might suit your path to solving this challenge. The 'Entra PowerShell' module, currently in Public Preview, shows great potential to soon be ready for production environments.