A Personal Note to the Access Community
Today is my last day at Microsoft. After many wonderful years, I have accepted Microsoft's Voluntary Retirement Program (VRP) and am beginning a new chapter. It feels a little surreal to write those words. For much of my career, I've had the privilege of working with products, communities, and people I deeply care about. In recent years, that has included serving as Program Manager for Microsoft Access, one of the most passionate, knowledgeable, and dedicated communities in technology. Before I go, there is one message I want to leave you with: Access is alive, well, and continuing to evolve. One of the most common questions I hear is, "Is Access going away?" The answer remains the same as it has always been: No. Access continues to ship with Microsoft 365 and Office, continues to receive engineering investment, continues to receive bug fixes, security updates, accessibility improvements, and yes, new features. In fact, we've released multiple new capabilities recently, including improvements such as enhanced zooming support, larger form and report design capabilities, and new developer-focused functionality, with additional features already in various stages of development and rollout. Over the last few years, I've had the opportunity to work alongside an incredibly talented engineering team that genuinely cares about Access and the customers who depend on it every day. I've seen firsthand the discussions, the prioritization meetings, the customer feedback reviews, the accessibility work, the bug triage sessions, and the long hours spent making sure Access continues to serve businesses, governments, schools, non-profits, and developers around the world. Access remains an important part of Microsoft's productivity ecosystem, and the team remains committed to keeping it relevant, reliable, and useful for years to come. I know many of you closely follow the public roadmap and occasionally worry when it's quiet. What doesn't always make it into public announcements is the steady stream of work happening behind the scenes: security investments, compliance work, accessibility improvements, bug fixes, customer-requested enhancements, and the engineering work required to keep a 30-plus-year-old product healthy in a rapidly changing technology landscape. As for what comes next, I don't yet know who the next Access PM will be or when that transition will occur. What I do know is that Access deserves thoughtful stewardship, active engagement with the community, and a clear understanding of why this product continues to matter. I am hopeful that whoever steps into that role will bring fresh ideas, curiosity, and a commitment to listening to the customers, MVPs, partners, and developers who make this community so special. To our MVPs: thank you for your advocacy, your feedback, and your willingness to tell us what we're doing right and what we're doing wrong. Many of the features we've delivered started as customer requests, conference conversations, forum discussions, and MVP feedback. Your voices matter, and they have made the product better. To the Access developers around the world: thank you for continuing to build solutions that solve real problems. Every time someone says Access is only a relic of the past, I inevitably hear from another organization running a mission-critical application, supporting a small business, managing a research project, tracking inventory, or helping people get work done. The creativity and ingenuity of this community never cease to amaze me. And finally, thank you for letting me be part of your journey. It's been an honor to help tell the story of Access, share new features, write documentation, engage with the community, and occasionally fight to get your favorite feature request prioritized. While I'm retiring from Microsoft, I'll always be rooting for Access and the people who use it. The future of Access belongs to all of you, and I believe that future is bright. Thank you for your support, your passion, and your trust. See you around, Linda Cannon Former Program Manager, Microsoft AccessWhat's New in Microsoft Entra: June 2026
Welcome to the June edition of our monthly newsletter, summarizing the latest news and developments in the exciting, ever-evolving world of Microsoft Entra. What went into General Availability (GA) since May 2026? Enable Phish‑Resistant MFA for Linux Desktops with Microsoft Entra - Microsoft Entra extends Phish Resistant Multi-Factor Authentication support to Linux desktops through the Microsoft identity broker, closing a long-standing gap in cross-platform identity. This update brings Linux to parity with Windows and macOS, enabling secure, modern authentication using phishing-resistant credentials. Support is now available for Ubuntu 24.04 and 26.04, as well as RHEL 8, 9, and 10, helping organizations consistently enforce strong authentication across all major desktop platforms. Enable improved B2C-to-External ID migration with High Scale Compatibility (HSC) mode – HSC mode is a new tenant-level migration option that lets Azure AD B2C customers transition their applications to Microsoft Entra External ID without re-registering users or resetting passwords, by keeping existing B2C credentials in place during coexistence. It's intended for high-scale tenants - generally those with 5 million or more objects - where the standard bulk migration with JIT password sync isn't practical. Tenants below the 5M threshold should continue to use the standard migration path, and even eligible high-scale tenants should carefully evaluate both options before choosing. Customers can run the B2C Policy Analyzer to assess migration readiness, and account teams and partners should engage the EEID migration team to guide eligible Azure Active Directory B2C customers toward the right migration path. Enable system-preferred authentication for first and second factors - Microsoft Entra ID updates system-preferred authentication to apply to both first-factor and second-factor authentication in Microsoft Managed state. The system evaluates registered credentials for the user and selects the highest-ranked method for each authentication step. This update applies automatically in the Microsoft managed state, ensuring seamless and secure authentication experiences. Modernize account management with redesigned My Account pages - Microsoft Entra introduces redesigned Devices, Security Info, and Organizations pages in the My Account portal. The Devices page simplifies registered device management and prominently surfaces BitLocker recovery keys, reducing IT helpdesk dependency. The Security Info page in Settings & Privacy centralizes profile information, language, and region settings for easier updates. The Organizations page resolves issues with end users leaving organizations and delivers a streamlined experience. These updates automatically roll out to Microsoft Entra ID customers by the end of June 2026, requiring no administrator action. Cross-tenant group synchronization in Microsoft Entra - This enables organizations to synchronize security groups and memberships across tenants for centralized management and consistent access control. This simplifies cross-tenant collaboration by allowing groups managed in a source tenant to be used in one or more target tenants for scenarios like shared application access and resource authorization. Beyond collaboration, this enables more seamless cross-tenant administration by allowing organizations to extend governance and access control consistently across tenant boundaries. Account discovery for connected applications in Microsoft Entra ID Governance - Administrators gain visibility into all accounts within connected applications, including orphan accounts not assigned to the enterprise application in Microsoft Entra. Generate discovery reports directly from the provisioning experience to identify access gaps and simplify application onboarding. This capability requires a Microsoft Entra ID Governance or Microsoft Entra Suite license. Automate agent identity sponsorship transitions - Microsoft Entra ID Governance ensures agent identities always have a delegated human sponsor accountable for their access and lifecycle. With Lifecycle Workflows, when a sponsor leaves the organization, sponsorship automatically transfers to their manager, maintaining continuity. Lifecycle workflows can also notify cosponsors and managers of impending sponsorship changes, streamlining the process and reducing manual oversight. Drive Passkey Adoption with Microsoft Entra Registration Campaigns - Microsoft Entra Registration Campaigns now supports Passkeys such as Fast Identity Online (FIDO2), as an authentication method. Administrators can configure registration campaigns to nudge users to register passkeys during sign-in, helping organizations drive passkey adoption. This first rollout experience is optimized for users in a passkey profile without restrictions. App Deactivation for Microsoft Entra applications - App Deactivation introduces a safe, reversible, and self-service way for app owners and admins to turn off applications that are unused, deprecated, or under investigation - without deleting them or breaking tenant-level governance. Deactivating an app registration provides a reversible way to prevent the application from accessing protected resources without permanently removing it from your tenant. When you deactivate an application, it immediately stops receiving new access tokens, but existing tokens remain valid until they expire. This approach is useful for security investigations, temporary suspension of suspicious applications, or when you need to maintain application configuration data. Unlike permanently deleting an application, deactivation preserves all application metadata, permissions, and configuration settings, making it easy to reactivate the application if needed. The application remains visible in your tenant's enterprise applications list, but users can't sign in and no new tokens are issued. Enable phishing-resistant sign-in with Microsoft Entra passkeys on Windows - Users register device-bound passkeys in the local Windows Hello container and use them for secure sign-in with Windows Hello biometrics or PIN. These passkeys function as FIDO2 credentials and work without requiring the device to be Microsoft Entra joined or registered. This capability is automatically available in tenants where passkey profiles permit Windows Hello as a provider, supporting phishing-resistant authentication for Entra-protected cloud resources. Interactive Windows console sign-in is not supported. New in Public Preview Support domain-less SAML Federation on workforce tenants - Domainless SAML federation with a SAML Identity Provider allows external users to authenticate into your apps or workforce resources using their IdP-managed credentials, regardless of their email domain. Domainless federation removes the need for domain matching between the user's email and pre-configured IdP domains during sign-in or invitation redemption. Sensitivity labels for Entra security groups - Microsoft Entra ID supports applying Microsoft Purview sensitivity labels to Entra cloud security groups in public preview. This enables administrators to use the same labels and policies already used for Microsoft 365 groups to govern security group behaviors such as guest access and other controls. Sensitivity labels are managed in Microsoft Purview and can be applied through the Entra Admin Center, Azure portal, and Microsoft Graph, helping organizations apply consistent governance across identities and access. Safely remove and restore devices with Device Soft Delete - This enables administrators to move device objects to a recoverable state instead of permanently deleting them. Organizations can restore devices within a defined retention period while preserving critical data like device identity and associated security artifacts. The feature supports Microsoft Entra joined, registered, and hybrid joined devices, reducing risks from accidental deletions and improving device lifecycle management. Move SAP SuccessFactors Provisioning to Workload Identity-based authentication - Microsoft Entra introduces Workload Identity-based authentication for SAP SuccessFactors provisioning, replacing long-lived usernames and passwords with Entra-managed credentials and short‑lived, standards‑based access tokens. This update allows customers to perform this authentication upgrade in-place on their existing provisioning jobs, without recreating or restarting them. This will switch their Entra or SuccessFactors integrations to a more secure model that is aligned with SAP SuccessFactors' plan to deprecate basic authentication for SAP SuccessFactors' APIs by November 2026. The new option applies to SAP SuccessFactors inbound provisioning to Active Directory and Microsoft Entra ID, as well as writeback scenarios, and improves security by eliminating the need to manually handle credentials and rotate them periodically. Govern Azure role assignments with access packages - Microsoft Entra enables governance of eligible and active assignments to Azure roles at the Management Group, Subscription, and Resource Group levels through access packages. Role assignments now follow the same request, approval, and lifecycle governance model as apps and groups. This simplifies managing access to Azure resources at scale while supporting least privilege and just-in-time access principles. Automate user attribute updates in Lifecycle Workflows - Microsoft Entra introduces the User Attribute Updates task in Lifecycle Workflows, enabling automated attribute changes directly within workflows. Administrators can set or clear attribute values including custom attributes with a secure, consistent, and auditable process. This feature reduces manual effort, enhances governance, and scales identity automation with confidence. Improve privileged identity response for Security Operations Center (SOC) – Microsoft is extending the Entra Security Operator role so SOC analysts can take identity response actions such as disable users, revoke sessions, mark users compromised, force password resets (including cloud-only accounts), and delete individual authentication methods , directly from the Microsoft Defender unified role-based access control (RBAC) experience, without broad Entra admin roles or identity and access management (IAM) escalation during active incidents. Permissions are scoped to non-admin users enabling faster containment, least-privilege boundaries, and auditability. Announcements Require registered methods for Self-Service Password Reset - Microsoft Entra Self-Service Password Reset (SSPR) will only accept explicitly registered authentication methods for identity verification starting September 7, 2026. Directory-sourced contact information, such as phone numbers and email addresses stored as user object properties, will no longer be accepted unless registered as authentication methods. This change applies to all users, including administrators, across Public cloud, GCC, GCC High, and DoD. Beginning July 6, 2026, Microsoft will automatically launch a registration campaign prompting affected users to register authentication methods after sign-in. Administrators should ensure users have at least one registered method to meet SSPR policy requirements before enforcement to avoid disruptions. Enforce conditional Access during credential registration - Starting July 6, 2026, Entra ID Conditional Access policies scoped to the Register security information user action will be evaluated during credential registration for Windows Hello for Business and macOS Platform SSO .This ensures registration policies apply consistently across all registration flows. Users must satisfy policy controls, such as multifactor authentication (MFA), network restrictions, device compliance, or other tenant defined requirement before completing registration. Organizations without Conditional Access policies targeting this user action are unaffected, and MFA remains required by default for all passwordless credential registrations. Enforcement completes by July 13, 2026. Expand passkey policy size and profiles in authentication methods policy - Microsoft Entra increases the passkey (Fast Identity Online 2, FIDO2) policy size limit to a dedicated 20 KB allocation within the authentication methods policy. Previously, all authentication methods shared a single 20 KB limit. This update ensures passkey policies have their own allocation, simplifying adoption and advanced targeting scenarios. Additionally, the maximum number of passkey profiles per tenant increases from 3 to 10, allowing greater flexibility in managing passkey configurations. New guidance and information Global Secure Access Operations Guide - The new GSA Operations Guide is your post-deployment companion for running Global Secure Access reliably at scale. It covers alerting, health checks, change management, metrics, and recovery playbooks, with ready-to-use KQL queries and templates you can adopt on day one. Capability-specific guides are included for Private Access, Internet Access, Remote Networks, and Microsoft Traffic. Tell us what you think! If you have feedback on this newsletter, fill out the dedicated Microsoft Form. Blogs Check out the latest blog posts on our Microsoft Entra Blog and our Microsoft Entra Identity Developer Blog. What's new in Microsoft Entra? Learn what is new with Microsoft Entra, such as the latest release notes, known issues, bug fixes, deprecation functionality, and upcoming changes. You can find releases specific for Sovereign Clouds on a dedicated release notes page. Become a certified Microsoft Identity and Access Administrator Check out the certification and related training for the Microsoft Identity and Access Administrator available for customers and partners. -Martin Coetzer Principal Product Manager, Identity and Network Access, Customer Experience Engineering (CXE) Microsoft Entra Community | LinkedIn Learn more about Microsoft Entra Prevent identity attacks, ensure least privilege access, unify access controls, and improve the experience for users with comprehensive identity and network access solutions across on-premises and clouds. Microsoft Entra News and Insights | Microsoft Security Blog Microsoft Entra blog | Tech Community Microsoft Entra documentation | Microsoft Learn Microsoft Entra discussions | Microsoft Community
