Setup the Microsoft Authenticator App with Microsoft 365
We are strongly advising our clients to move over to Multi Form Factor authentication (MFA) to secure their Microsoft 365 services. Brute force login attacks are on the increase and having a strong password is just not enough these days.
First of all, you need to download the Microsoft Authenticator App to your mobile device and you can find instructions from the following link:
Once done we need to setup the Authenticator app within Office.
Sign into your account by going to outlook.office.com and logging in with your usual details.
Once logged in, please click your initials in the top right corner, and click on ‘View account’
2. You should now have a menu down the left-hand side of the screen. Click on ‘Security info’. Once here, click on the ‘+ Add method’ button and select Authenticator app.
3. Click next through the options until you see a QR code to scan. We will need this later.
Configuring Microsoft Authenticator Mobile app
Find and open the Microsoft Authenticator application that you installed previously. Click on add an account and then click scan a QR code. You can then hold the camera up to the QR code you receieved on your PC.
Once you have scanned the QR code, click next through all the options on the PC. You should now see the email account appear within the app. On the PC, click next throughout the options and you will now have Microsoft Authenticator appear under methods.
3. Above the Microsoft Authenticator method we have added, click on set default sign-in method and change this to the bottom option to Microsoft Authencicator – notification if you want notifications each time or Microsoft Authenticator app or hardware token – code if you want traditional one time codes, then press confirm.
Authenticator Setup Completed
Microsoft Authenticator is now setup, and your email account is linked to your phone. Shortly, you will be prompted to enter a code. This will happen for all Microsoft apps that you have such as Outlook and MS Teams.
To get this code, open up your Microsoft Authenticator app on your phone and click on the account you added. You will see a 6-digit code, this refreshes and changes every 30 seconds
Once you have entered this code, your device should remember it so that you do not have to enter it everytime you go to log in. However, accessing your accounts from a different device will require you to enter a new code. This helps to stop attackers from gaining access to your account, as not only do they now need the password, but they also need the code from your phone!
In this post we will show you how to manage your safe senders and domains in the Outlook Web App
Office 365 has a very good email security and spam filtering system but sometimes it can be frustrating when you keep on getting the same old messages, from the old same senders, always going into your Junk Email folder. Simply moving these emails back to your inbox does not have any effect and the next email you get from them goes back into the Junk Email folder.
If you are experiencing this issue and you have legitimate emails that are ending up in your Junk Email, you can easily add the email address to the safe senders and domains list which effectively whitelists them and stops the problem.
If you’re familiar with Hotmail or Outlook.com mail, it is a very similar process.
Here is what you need to do in the Outlook Web App in Office 365
We are now partners and resellers of BackupAssist. With BackupAssist you can survive cyber attacks, ransomware, natural disasters, hardware failures and user accidents. BackupAssist guides you to a clear path to recovery. Backups are essential and having the right solution in place is crucial. Your solution needs to be reliable, easy to use and quick to perform any urgent data restores.
There are two options to choose from with BackupAssist, please find below a summary of both;
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Drive imaging and bare metal recovery for physical and virtual servers. File based backups to cloud.
Backup to USB HDD, NAS, RDX, A3, Azure and more.
Granular backup and recovery of Exchange, SQL, Hyper-V.
Users often think that their Office 365 and cloud data is backed up. While there is some level of a cloud recycle bin and a deleted items retention period for Email in Office 365 that is just not enough, in our opinion, and you will also need a reliable and secure cloud backup solution. Summary below;
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These are the reasons why we have become resellers of BackupAssist and if you want anymore information please – Contact us
The day has arrived and good old Windows 7 and Server 2008 R2 are finally retiring and support for these operating systems is going to be discontinued. It has been a good run and we have had many years of dependable computing and decent server operating systems. Windows 7 was probably one of my favourite Windows builds but with age and new ways in which technology is doing things it just could not keep up.
What will happen with Windows 7 and Server 2008 R2
No more Bug fixes
No more security Updates
No more Malware protection
Compatibility issues with applications
Seriously though I know a lot of our followers are still using Windows 7, it is not just going to stop working today but using these operating systems will slowly become more and more risky as there will be no more updates or patches plus hackers are surely going to target it and find as many exploits as possible. Remember a few years ago when Ransomware was rife? It came out of nowhere and hit a lot of systems that were not completely up to date, well I can see similar problems in the future for Windows 7 and 2008 R2.
We can help you upgrade from Windows 7 and Server 2008 R2
I know it is different and we do not like change, but Windows 10 has evolved and has got better on every new build and update furthermore TC-IT Services can help make the transition over to this new operating as seamless as possible for you.
If you wanted to do the process yourself you can start by going to the Windows 10 download page; https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/software-download/windows10
If you are still running Server 2008 R2 or SBS 2011, which runs on Server 2008 R2, you need to act sooner rather than later as having your server attacked could have much more serious consequences.
At TC-IT Services we are cloud service providers so have many options to migrate your server to the cloud. If you are still using Exchange 2010 or higher, we can migrate all your email and other Outlook data seamlessly to Office 365 as well.
OR if you still want the ability to have your own server and control where you data is, upgrading your domain or stand-alone network to Windows Server 2019 is pretty straight forward. We have performed many of these migrations for our customers to date so we can help with this. Once complete we can de-commission your old server or domain controllers properly making the transition seamless.
There are so many advantages of Windows 10, migrating your servers to the cloud or moving to a current server operating system. If you need any more information or just want to chat about it all please don’t hesitiate to speak to one of our experts on 01273 987926 or contact us here.
Today we are going to show you how to set up Automatic Replies (Out of Office) for Outlook. Simply follow our step-by-step guide below to create Automatic Replies for Outlook.
(This guide is applicable for Microsoft Outlook 2010 onwards)
Firstly, Click on to File in the top left-hand corner
And then click on to Automatic Replies
A window will open in the centre of the screen, in order to edit/type into it click on; ‘Send automatic replies’
Please note you can set a date and time range if you want but in this example we will not set one
Now you will be able to Type into both the Inside & Outside of the organisation tabs.
I have already filled out an example of inside, please note you will need to fill out the inside section REGARDLESS whether you going to use it or not, otherwise you wouldn’t be send automatic replies.
Once you have filled out you’re inside my organisation tab, click onto the outside my organisation. (If not look above)
Now you fill out your message to anyone, outside of the company who emails you.
When you are happy with it click ok.
Now you will see the Automatic Replies section has become highlighted, which means Automatic Replies will be sent to whoever emails you, until it is turned off.
Outlook will also display a banner for you when you are not in this menu. (See below)
To turn off Automatic replies click on ‘Turn Off’ under file OR on the banner above
We hope that this has helped you add Automatic Replies to Outlook. Here are a number of other useful guides available on our blog.
The day has arrived and good old Windows 7 and Server 2008 R2 are finally retiring and support for these operating systems is going to be discontinued. It has been a good run and we have had many years of dependable computing and decent server operating systems. Windows 7 was probably one of my favourite Windows builds but with age and new ways in which technology is doing things it just could not keep up.
