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CptnGridIron's avatar
CptnGridIron
Copper Contributor
Jun 30, 2022

Outlook Disconnected MFA causing issue

Hello, have researched all over for this specific issue and have came up with a lot of information, however, no permanent fixes.  Have some mailboxes that seem to keep going into disconnected checking the status shows Authn Error.  The issue seems to be with MFA and Outlook somehow going into basic auth(My best guess) because whenever MFA is disabled one the account it works properly connects, etc..  This is happening with the Office 365 on the newest update.  Also hybrid setup with local AD and 365 sync.  Things that have been tried:

Microsoft's regedit to force modern authentication

Recreating the windows profile (Did this and a user called back the next day with Outlook disconnected)

Running Microsoft Sara

Reboot (will fix temporarily then break)

Clearing all creds in credential manager

Clearing out the identity key in registry under Office\16\common

I haven't tried reaching out to MS and see if there's something they can do, I'm out of ideas and all the fixes that worked for others definitely haven't worked for me.

exchange
office 365
Windows 10
  • NickWhittome1620's avatar
    NickWhittome1620
    Copper Contributor
    Jul 27, 2022

    CptnGridIron 

    Yup - identical experience.  Multiple disconnects per day - particular after coming back from hibernation. Connection status showing error in authn column.  Other Office apps impacted too as they will hang when trying to access SP/OneDrive.  Only option is to reboot.  Went even further than you - completely wiped machine and rebuilt but issue came back.  Deleted OL profile multiple times. Searched high & low for answers but no joy.

    Also believe that this is related to MFA as I only ever experience this when out of the office.  The office egress IP is defined as a trusted location so users never get prompted for MFA when here.  My machine works flawlessly all day when here.  Deeply frustrating...

    • CptnGridIron's avatar
      CptnGridIron
      Copper Contributor
      Jul 27, 2022

      NickWhittome1620 

       

      I’ve mostly given up and pushed the people having issues to the PWA, seems to slowly be a cascading nightmare every couple of weeks a new person same issue.  Not even sure where to go with it.

      • NickWhittome1620's avatar
        NickWhittome1620
        Copper Contributor
        Aug 12, 2022

        CptnGridIron 

         

        Quick follow-up on this one.  This is not definitive and I'm still testing...but results so far are interesting.

         

        I was noticing that when the issue happens, it's not just Outlook.  Issues with SharePoint files not saving/syncing and very odd issues with our corporate VPN where I could connect and ping internal resources but not access any web interfaces.

         

        I also noticed that when I recently spent several days in another location and exclusively on wi-fi, the issue did not happen once.

         

        Long story short, I found that the issue happens when at home or in the office (forget the previous comment about the issue not happening in the office - it did happen!) and when connected via ethernet (using a dock) and connected to wifi at the same time.

         

        Still testing...but at this point, if I disable wifi when docked, the issue does not happen. 

         

        My device is a Dell Latitude 5420.  Would be curious if anyone else can confirm this behaviour.  Will revert back after a few more days of testing.

         

  • Carol DeMuth's avatar
    Carol DeMuth
    Brass Contributor
    Jul 27, 2022
    Are your devices enrolled in Endpoint Manager? We have had this issue when staff change their password and ignore the Fix your account notification that pops up. I have had to go into their Account settings and click on the Email settings to fix and/or update.
    • Micke640's avatar
      Micke640
      Brass Contributor
      Jun 05, 2023
      HI!

      I have now two scenarios' when one user get disconnected from Outlook, Onedrive, SP
      1 User computer (dell Latitude ) gets into hibernation, users start working and after some time he ses that he hasn't go any email. Restart is the only thing that works
      2 MFA, we activated the MFA on the same user, same thing happens as above.

      Kidd_Ip where do i change oder for MFA before User ID and Password
      CptnGridIron do you have any news on this
      • CptnGridIron's avatar
        CptnGridIron
        Copper Contributor
        Jun 05, 2023

        Micke640 

         

        Hello,

         

        Unfortunately, as previously mentioned the only thing that consistently works for us is disconnecting users account in settings, rebooting and then signing in one at a time saying “No, sign into this app only” nothing else has personally worked for us.

  • NickWhittome1620's avatar
    NickWhittome1620
    Copper Contributor
    Aug 16, 2023

    CptnGridIron 

    Finally - a definitive answer to this seemingly endless problem.  All caused by the SonicWall NetExtender VPN client.  I won't go into the gory details...but that's the issue fixed for me.

     

    Just a few days ago, SonicWall released the latest version of the client (10.2.336) and the release notes  talk about issue SMA-4585 having been addressed. 

     

    https://software.sonicwall.com/NetExtender/Documentation/232-005799-00_RevF_NetExtender_10.2.336_ReleaseNotes.pdf 

     

    Clearly not!  I have opened a ticket with SonicWall to tell them.  Until they fix this properly, there is an easy workaround for Windows 11:

     Settings -> Network & internet -> Proxy "Set up" -> toggle the Use a proxy server button, Save -> Then untoggle and save.

    I don't even want to think about the hours of lost productivity because of this one. ;-(