MFA Archives

Lifeline or Liability: Managing Emergency Accounts in Hybrid Environments

Post author:By Brandon Colley

In this blog, we explore why break-glass accounts are your lifeline when identity systems fail. Microsoft’s updated guidance calls for two cloud-only Entra ID accounts with phishing-resistant MFA and restricted AD Administrator accounts limited to domain controllers. Excluding them from Conditional Access, storing credentials offline, and testing regularly ensures your emergency access is a lifeline — not a liability.

Entra ID

December 3, 2025

2 Comments

Practical Protection: Microsoft Doubles Down on Azure MFA Enforcement

Post author:By Paul Robichaux

Microsoft is rolling out Phase 2 of Azure services MFA enforcement starting October 1, 2025. This update requires MFA for all Azure Resource Manager operations. In this article, we dive into what you need to do to comply with the new enforcement requirements.

Entra ID

September 18, 2025

3 Comments

Using Conditional Access to Combat Token Theft

Post author:By Thijs Lecomte

With AiTM phishing attacks on the rise, it is important to have procedures in place to combat future attacks. In this article, we explore three different ways to protect against token theft using Conditional Access.

Security

April 2, 2025

6 Comments

Practical Graph: Nag Users to Upgrade to a Strong Authentication Method

Post author:By Tony Redmond

Convincing people to use MFA is one challenge. Convincing them to use a stronger authentication method than SMS is another. This article explains how to use PowerShell to find people still using SMS for MFA and send email to ask them to upgrade their authentication method.

Microsoft Entra ID

March 10, 2025

Free Copilot Chat Lands For All, Exchange Audit Logging Changes & The New Outlook Arrives: The Practical 365 Podcast S4 E34

Post author:By Steve Goodman

Join Steve Goodman and Paul Robichaux to discuss Microsoft's latest announcements, including the surprise move to make Copilot Chat free for all Microsoft 365 users, significant changes coming to Exchange Online audit logging, and the new Outlook's arrival via Windows Update. Plus, get their takes on Microsoft's major AI reorganization with the new CoreAI division, and what all these changes mean for IT pros as we start 2025.

Blog

January 23, 2025

3 Comments

Practical Protection: Getting Ready for MFA Enforcement in Microsoft 365

Post author:By Paul Robichaux

Starting in February 2025, Microsoft is going to enforce MFA for all access to the Microsoft 365 admin center—both for users and administrators. Let this episode of Practical Protection serve as a reminder to configure MFA for your tenant, if you haven’t already!

Blog

November 27, 2024

One comment

Four Practical Tools and Strategies for Success with Conditional Access Policies

Post author:By Jasper Baes

Many organizations still find it challenging to implement Conditional Access effectively. Luckily, there is a solution for this. In this blog, we share a new open-source framework, introducing 4 tools to help create and validate access policies and strategies, ensuring that security measures are effective and efficient.

Security

October 30, 2024

Practical Sentinel: Auditing Multifactor Authentication with Sentinel

Post author:By Thijs Lecomte

In this episode of Practical Sentinel, Thijs Lecomte discusses how to create some basic KQL queries to track MFA usage.

Sentinel

June 5, 2024

Practical Protection: Copying Microsoft’s Secure Future Initiative

Post author:By Paul Robichaux

Microsoft recently released a memo from Security VP, Charlie Bell. In this blog, we recap the memo and discuss some of the new security initiatives Microsoft is working towards.

Security

May 16, 2024

19 Comments

Understanding the Exchange Managed Folder Assistant

Post author:By Tony Redmond

The Exchange Managed Folder Assistant (MFA) is responsible for processing retention policies against Exchange Server and Exchange Online mailboxes. In this article, we review details of how the MFA works and how administrators can gain an insight into what it does.