Note This topic does not include information about security features that allow or prohibit access to individual Office 365 resources (for example, role-based access control in Microsoft Exchange Online or configuring security in Microsoft SharePoint Online). For details about these features, see the and the. If you need information about tools that can help you perform administrative tasks, see. To learn how to perform day-to-day management tasks, see.
I’ve been waiting in vain for a promise to allow those accounts to be linked or merged so you could have a single sign-on for all Microsoft services. (In the meantime, here’s how to tell the difference between a Microsoft account and an Office 365 account.). Jul 5, 2017 - This package does not include Outlook, Publisher, and Access. Office 365 Personal allows you to install Office on one PC or Mac at a. If you're happy using Microsoft Office through a web browser, you can. Disclaimer: Most of the pages on the internet include affiliate links, including some on this site.
Need help signing in, installing or uninstalling, or canceling your subscription? Get help with For other issues with Office 365 visit the. To get support for Office 365 operated by 21Vianet in China, contact the. For Office 365 Germany, contact the.
Sign-in options Office 365 has two systems that can be used for user identities:. Work or school account (cloud identity) Users receive Azure Active Directory cloud credentials—separate from other desktop or corporate credentials—for signing into Office 365 and other Microsoft cloud services. This is the default identity, and is recommended in order to minimize deployment complexity. Passwords for work or school accounts use the Azure Active Directory. Federated account (federated identity) For all subscriptions in organizations with on-premises Active Directory that use single sign-on (SSO), users can sign into Office 365 services by using their Active Directory credentials. The corporate Active Directory stores and controls the password policy.
For information about SSO, see. The type of identity affects the user experience and user account management options, as well as hardware and software requirements and other deployment considerations.
Custom domains and identity options When you create a new user, the user's sign-in name and email address are assigned to the default domain as set in the Office 365 admin center. To learn more, see. By default, the Office 365 subscription uses the.onmicrosoft.com domain that was created with the account.
You can add one or more custom domains to Office 365 rather than retaining the onmicrosoft.com domain, and can assign users to sign in with any of the validated domains. Each user's assigned domain is the email address that will appear on sent and received email messages.
You can host up to 900 registered Internet domains in Office 365, each represented by a different namespace. For organizations using single sign-on, all users on a domain must use the same identity system: either cloud identity or federated identity. For example, you could have one group of users that only needs a cloud identity because they don't access on-premises systems, and another group of users who use Office 365 and on-premises systems. You would use add two domains to Office 365, such as contractors.contoso.com and staff.contoso.com, and only set up SSO for one of them. An entire domain can be converted from cloud identity to federated identity, or from federated identity to cloud identity. For more information about domains in Office 365, see the service description. If you are using Office 365 operated by 21Vianet in China, the default domain is.onmsChina.cn.
If you are using Office 365 Germany, the default domain is.onmicrosoft.de Authentication With the exception of internet sites for anonymous access created with SharePoint Online, users must be authenticated when accessing Office 365 services. Modern authentication Modern authentication brings Active Directory Authentication Library (ADAL)-based sign-in to Office client apps across platforms.
This enables sign-in features such as Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA), SAML-based third-party identity providers with Office client applications, and smart card and certificate-based authentication. It also removes the need for Microsoft Outlook to use the basic authentication protocol. For more information, including the availability of modern authentication across Office applications, see. Modern authentication is not turned by default for Exchange Online. To learn how to turn it on, see. Cloud identity authentication Users with cloud identities are authenticated using traditional challenge/response. The web browser is redirected to the Office 365 sign-in service, where you type the user name and password for your work or school account.
The sign-in service authenticates your credentials and generates a service token, which the web browser posts to the requested service and logs you in. Federated identity authentication Users with federated identities are authenticated using Active Directory Federation Services (AD FS) 2.0 or other Security Token Services. The web browser is redirected to the Office 365 sign-in service, where you type your corporate ID in the form a user principal name (UPN; for example, [email protected]). The sign-in service determines that you are part of a federated domain and offers to redirect you to the on-premises Federation Server for authentication. If you are logged on to the desktop (domain joined), you are authenticated (using Kerberos or NTLMv2) and the on-premises Security Token Service generates a logon token, which the web browser posts to the Office 365 sign-in service. Using the logon token, the sign-in service generates a service token that the web browser posts to the requested service and logs you in.
For a list of available Security Token Services available, see. Office 365 uses forms-based authentication, and authentication traffic over the network is always encrypted with TLS/SSL using port 443. Authentication traffic uses a negligible percentage of bandwidth for Office 365 services. Multi-Factor Authentication for Office 365 With Multi-Factor Authentication for Office 365., users are required to acknowledge a phone call, text message, or an app notification on their smartphone after correctly entering their password. Only after this second authentication can the user sign in. Office 365 administrators can enroll users for multi-factor authentication in the Office 365 admin center. Learn more about.
Rich client authentication For rich clients such as Microsoft Office desktop applications, authentication can occur in two ways:. Microsoft Online Services Sign-In Assistant The Sign-in assistant, which is installed by Office 365 desktop setup, contains a client service that obtains a service token from the Office 365 sign-in service and returns it to the rich client.
If you have a cloud identity, you receive a prompt for credentials, which the client service sends to the Office 365 sign-in service for authentication (using WS-Trust). If you have a federated identity, the client service first contacts the AD FS 2.0 server to authenticate the credentials (using Kerberos or NTLMv2) and obtain a logon token that is sent to the Office 365 sign-in service (using WS-Federation and WS-Trust). Basic/proxy authentication over SSL The Outlook client passes basic authentication credentials over SSL to Exchange Online. Exchange Online proxies the authentication request to the Office 365 identity platform, and then to on-premises Active Directory Federation Server (for SSO). To ensure proper discovery and authentication of Office 365 services, administrators must apply a set of components and updates to each workstation that uses rich clients (such as Microsoft Office 2010) and connects to Office 365. Office 365 desktop setup is an automated tool to configure workstations with the required updates. For more information, see.
Note 1 When first prompted, you can save your password for future use. You will not receive another prompt until you change the password. 2 You enter your corporate credentials. You can save your password and will not be prompted again until your password changes. 3 All apps require you to enter your username or click to sign in. You are not prompted for your password if your computer is joined to the domain. If you click Keep me signed in you will not be prompted again until you sign out.
4 If you click Keep me signed in you will not be prompted again until you sign out. Creating user accounts There are multiple ways for you to add users to Office 365. To learn more, see.
If you are using Office 365 operated by 21Vianet in China, see. Deleting accounts How you delete accounts depends on whether or not you are using directory synchronization:. If you are not using directory synchronization, accounts can be deleted by using the Office 365 Admin page or by using Windows PowerShell.
If you are using directory synchronization, you must delete users from the local Active Directory, rather than from Office 365. When an account is deleted, it becomes inactive. For approximately 30 days after having deleted it, you can restore the account. For more information about deleting and restoring accounts, see or, if you are using Office 365 operated by 21Vianet in China, see.
Password management The policies and procedures for password management depend on the identity system. Cloud identity password management: When using cloud identities, passwords are automatically generated when the account is created.
For cloud identity password strength requirements, see. To increase security, users must change their passwords when they first access Office 365 services. As a result, before users can access Office 365 services, they must sign into the Office 365 portal, where they are prompted to change their passwords.
Admins can set the password expiration policy. For more information, see. There are several tools for resetting passwords for users with cloud identities:. Admin resets password If users lose or forget their passwords, admins can reset users' passwords in the Office 365 portal or by using Windows PowerShell. Users can only change their own password if they know their existing password. For Enterprise plans, if administrators lose or forget their passwords, a different administrator with the Global Administrator role can reset administrators' passwords in the Office 365 admin center or by using Windows PowerShell.
For more information, see. If you are working in Office 365 operated by 21Vianet in China, see. User changes passwords with Outlook Web App The Outlook Web App options page includes a Change password hyperlink, which redirects users to the Change Password page. The user must know their previous password. For more information, see.
If you are using Office 365 operated by 21Vianet in China, see. Role-based reset password rights For Enterprise plans, authorized users such as helpdesk staff can be assigned the Reset Password user right and the right to change passwords by using the Office 365 predefined or custom roles without becoming full services administrators. By default in Enterprise plans, admins with the Global Administrator, Password Administrator, or User Management Administrator role can change passwords. For more information, see. Reset passwords using Windows PowerShell Service administrators can use Windows PowerShell to reset passwords. Federated identity password management: When using federated identities, passwords are managed in Active Directory.
The on-premises Security Token Service negotiates the authentication with Office 365 Federation Gateway without passing users' local Active Directory passwords over the Internet to Office 365. Local password policies are used, or, for web clients, two-factor identification. Outlook Web App does not include a Change Password hyperlink.
Users change their passwords using standard, on-premises tools or through their desktop PC logon options. If you have enabled in your Office 365 environment and there is an outage that impacts your federated identity provider, Password Sync Backup for Federated Sign-in provides the option to manually switch your domain to Password Sync. Using Password Sync will allow your users to access Office 365 while the outage is fixed. License management An Office 365 license gives a user access to a set of Office 365 services.
An administrator assigns a license to each user for the service they need access to. For example, you can assign a user access to Skype for Business Online, but not SharePoint Online. Office 365 billing admins can make changes to subscription details like the number of user licenses and number of additional services your company uses.
If you are using Office 365 operated by 21Vianet, see. Group management Security groups are used in SharePoint Online to control access to sites. Security groups can be created in the Office 365 admin center. For more information about security groups, see. Administrator roles Office 365 Enterprise follows a role-based access control (RBAC) model: permissions and capabilities are defined by management roles.
The person who signs up for Office 365 for his or her organization automatically becomes a global administrator, or top-level administrator. There are five administrator roles: global administrator, billing administrator, password administrator, service administrator, and user management administrator. For more information about administrator roles in Office 365 Enterprise, including how they apply to Exchange Online, SharePoint Online, and Skype for Business Online administration, see. If you are using Office 365 operated by 21Vianet in China, see.
Delegated administration and support for partners Partners can be authorized to administer accounts on behalf of customers. The customer does not require a user account for the partners use and does not consume an Office 365 license when granting delegated administration authority. Partners can assign full or limited access to users within their organization.
Limited access includes rights to reset passwords, manage service requests, and monitor service health. To learn more, see. Note Ability to use and specify a partner as a delegated administrator varies by region. Azure Active Directory services Azure Active Directory (AD) brings comprehensive identity and access management capabilities to Office 365. It combines directory services, advanced identity governance, application access management and a rich standards-based platform for developers. To learn more about AD features in Office 365, see. Learn more about the.
Feature availability To view feature availability across Office 365 plans, standalone options, and on-premise solutions, see.