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Outlook 2016 with MFA enabled MSA
Here's the basic question.
Does Outlook 2016 support MFA enabled MSAs without requiring the use of App Passwords?
In other words, is modern authentication (notification, text, call) capable when wiring up an MSA to Outlook 2016?
Here is why I'm asking. I thought that the answer to this question was yes, but my recent experience is no. I am not talking about Office 365 Azure AD MFA enabled account. I understand the requirement on the Office 365 side to enable the tenant for modern authentication. I am talking about a consumer account (Hotmail.com, live.com, outlook.com). I am not talking about an MSA that is using a duplicate work account. This is a straight MSA.
I've been working with customers to enable MFA on all Office 365 accounts. Many have existing MSAs that they use for personal email and they want those in Outlook 2016, side-by-side with their Office 365 email account. The Office 365 MFA experience is behaving as expected.
I've established MFA on the MSA and it's functioning properly. MFA is active via the web and via mobile, but Outlook 2016 will not present the modern authentication screen when initially wiring up the MSA (using autodiscover, maybe manual would be different). The account can be configured, but it requires the use of an App Password. It's not that it won't work, but rather that App Passwords are really hard to explain to average users. App Passwords add a complexity and confusion that I try to avoid.
I opened a ticket with Office 365 support, but it's slow going. We've spent the better part of two days just going back and forth agreeing on scope. They initially content that it's not within their scope. We've finally come to an agreement so I can move forward, but I find it interesting that a basic question of yes or no it works or doesn't has been so elusive.
So I turn to the community. Have any of you, recently, connected an MFA enabled Microsoft Account (MSA) to Outlook 2016 (desktop) without having to use an app password?
If there is documentation on this specific topic one way or the other, I can't find it. A link would be much appreciated.
Thanks,
Andy Baerst
2fa Support for consumer accounts is new to outlook 2016 (should be available in updates this month), so if you need the app password now, you soon won’t. Gmail 2fa support is coming too - I thought in the same update, but haven’t tested it yet.
11 Replies
I haven't checked the process "recently", but I have my MFA-protected outlook.com account running alongside my MFA-protected O365 account in Outlook with no issues. Have you tried new profile, or different machine?
Do you remember if, when you initially wired up the account into Outlook 2016, you used an App Password or were able to do it using actual 2-step methods (app notification, text message, code) for identity verification purposes?
To be honest, I don't remember what I used, but I'd trust Diane's answer on this - she's the authority on anything Outlook related :)
