Microsoft Search - does not respect hidden user accounts!

[Dorje McKinnon]

Hi Everyone,

We have hybrid onprem and M365 environment.

To hide user accounts e.g. service accounts from SharePoint online intranet search we use @Tania Menice method of setting the Exchange property msExchHideFromAddressLists = true

https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/sharepoint-support-blog/exclude-users-from-delve-and-sharepoi...

To illustrate the issue lets assume:

- In active directory on premise and azure a user exists Careers@mycompany.co.nz

- This user has msExchHideFromAddressLists = true, so searching for Careers in Outlook shows no suggested email address 

If we were using Classic SharePoint Online search this is fine e.g. /search/Pages/peopleresults.aspx#k=careers will not return our test user

BUT

We are using the Microsoft Search , organisation wide within our SharePoint online environment. Searching for careers  /_layouts/15/search.aspx?q=careers shows our test user despite msExchHideFromAddressLists = true

If we search for careers again and add the    -"SPS-HideFromAddressLists":1    term to our search we get /_layouts/15/search.aspx?q=careers%20%20-"SPS-HideFromAddressLists"%3A1 and our test user is not shown.

My question to you dear reader: Is there somewhere I can set Microsoft Search so that it respects msExchHideFromAddressLists not just in the People vertical but in the ALL vertical ?

NOTE

I also tested BING logged in as my work account, exactly the same behaviour even down to understanding the   -"SPS-HideFromAddressLists":1   term.

[#2]

So this morning (Monday 9am NZ time) about 36 hours after I posted this message, and ... yes Microsoft Search now respects msExchHideFromAddressLists = true flag.

• Internal sharepoint online ALL vertical search doesn't return the Careers user
• Bing Work vertical doesn't return the Careers user

I doubt anything has changed on the M365 side, my guess is that the change I made to On Premise Active Directory just took longer than the documented time to flow through the system.

This makes sense because as I understand it search makes use of , search results not the actual setting on the actual item at the time the user does the search. So effectively search caches the state of that item until search re-indexes the item.

>>> Lesson for me <<< and hopefully useful to you.

Wait for a while.

Does anyone have a general rule about how long this type of change takes to flow through ?

NOTE - the one thing I did do after posting my original message, was edit the user's on Premise MailExchangeNickName (I added a hyphen, saved, applied the change, then removed it and saved and applied the change). This may have made a difference ?

[#3]

@Dorje McKinnon 

In my experience - Setting “ShowInAddressList” Azure AD User object property to “false” is the most effective way to hide an account from m365 search. Exchange property "HiddenFromAddressListsEnabled" and SharePoint User Profile property "SPS-HideFromAddressLists" are synchronized with “ShowInAddressList” Azure AD User object property .
Here is my research: Hide User Accounts from Microsoft 365 People Search (for real)

[#4]

@Vladilen This is only work on sync users ,what about cloud users , what is steps for fully cloud account (service account-without license) .

[#5]

Hi, am having same issue for the past 2 weeks. I don't know what to do? Is there some one who can help me.

[#6]

I validated it on cloud-born users