Shared Mailbox Access

[cllee]

Hi,

I have remove the license of a mailbox, and convert the mailbox to Shared Mailbox. However the Shared Mailbox can still be accessible by signing-in from OWA. Is that the normal behavior?

Once is converted to Shared Mailbox, should the login access be remove?

Thanks.

[#2]

Yes, that's the expected behavior. If you don't want people to access the mailbox anymore, remove the permissions. 

[#3]

Hi Vasil,

Is not the assigned member who is accessing the Shared Mailbox. But the original account password can still be used to login.

Scenario is if I have an employee who left the company, and I have converted his account to a Shared Mailbox. But he is still able to access his mailbox through Outlook.com, by signing-in using his existing password.

My understanding was once converted to a Shared Mailbox, the Shared Mailbox will not be an active account and cannot be login anymore, or setup for SMTP.

Correct me if I'm wrong.

Thanks.

[#4]

Right, that's also an "expected" behavior, as Microsoft doesn't enforce licensing requirements in code. Being able to login directly to a shared mailbox is something that has worked for ages, it's simply not often discussed publicly as it's against the license agreement.

[#5]

@Vasil Michev 

So it is still advisable to reset the password once the employee left the company, while maintaining their account as Shared Mailbox.

[#6 · Accepted solution]

Well, given that O365 is a cloud service, available anywhere from any location, not changing the password for a departed user is just asking for trouble. Anyway, Microsoft's guidance on the whole "departed" user is still a bit unclear, they've positioned "inactive mailboxes" for this scenario, but then did the whole "convert to shared mailbox" thingy as part of the "remove user" wizard. Here's an article from a while back where I compare the two methods: https://practical365.com/exchange-online/shared-mailboxes-vs-inactive-mailboxes-departed-users/

[#7]

@Vasil Michev 

Thanks for the link. Appreciate.