M365 Weekly Newsletter
Issue #184
☁️Productivity & Modern Workplace
How to Filter Email Attachments with Power Automate. Power Automate can streamline your email management by filtering and storing specific attachments. Set up a workflow that triggers when an email arrives, including only those with attachments. Use a loop to iterate over each attachment and apply conditions to keep only desired file types, like PDFs or Excel files. You can also configure it to exclude inline attachments, such as email signatures. This ensures you only store essential attachments.
How to Create a Teams Avatar from a Photo. Creating a Teams avatar from a photo might sound like a fun idea, but the results could be underwhelming. While Microsoft provides a service plan for Mesh Avatars across various Microsoft 365 plans, the quality of avatars generated from photos often falls short of expectations.
Step-by-Step: Enabling Noise Suppression in Microsoft Teams Meeting. Background noise in Microsoft Teams meetings can be a significant distraction, but you can enhance audio quality by utilizing Teams’ advanced audio settings.
☁️Copilot & AI
The missed SMB AI opportunity. Twelve months after Microsoft 365 Copilot’s launch, many resellers and MSPs are still hesitant about adopting AI, reminiscent of the cloud adoption lag. This reluctance may cause them to miss out on significant business opportunities, as AI’s rapid customer adoption highlights a growing gap.
Learn Copilot Studio in One Hour – Full Crash Course with Real-Life Use Cases for Beginners. You can create powerful AI companions using Co-pilot Studio, a tool for building chatbots and agents. It offers a low-code interface, allowing you to build agents without needing coding skills. Co-pilot Studio integrates with various data sources like SharePoint and DataVerse, enabling your agents to provide more relevant information.
Mastering Projects with Microsoft 365 Copilot. Copilot automates tasks like drafting project documents and meeting notes, allowing you to focus on the project itself. Co-pilot can also assist in managing project plans by summarizing key points and suggesting next steps. Additionally, it simplifies email management by generating responses and setting up meetings efficiently.
☁️Sysadmin Stuff
Microsoft Entra Password Protection – How to enable / configure “Custom Banned Passwords”. Custom banned passwords in Microsoft Entra help strengthen organizational security by blocking specific terms from being used in passwords. These terms often include local words, company names, or common phrases that are easy to guess and vulnerable to dictionary attacks. To configure custom banned passwords, you need a Microsoft Entra tenant with at least a P1 license and an account with the Authentication Policy Administrator role.
How to use Direct Send in Microsoft 365. When sending emails through Microsoft 365, you have several options like Direct Send, SMTP Relay, and SMTP Auth. Direct Send is easy to set up but limited to internal recipients. It doesn’t require authentication and uses port 25. SMTP Relay allows sending to external recipients but requires a public IP address for authentication. SMTP Auth uses OAuth and is more reliable but often not supported on devices like scanners.
Managing automatic switching in Microsoft Edge for Business. Microsoft Edge for Business offers a dedicated work browsing experience, allowing IT administrators to manage policies and features across both managed and unmanaged devices. It automatically separates work and personal browsing, enhancing security and productivity. This feature is available in Microsoft Edge stable release version 120 and later.
☁️Security & Data Governance
Protecting your Break Glass accounts in Entra now that MFA gets enforced on more and more Admin portals. Microsoft is enhancing security by making Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA) mandatory for various admin portals. To manage break glass accounts effectively, limit their number, use strong MFA methods like FIDO2 keys, monitor activity, and maintain clear documentation. This approach aligns with Microsoft’s Secure Future Initiative to combat sophisticated cyber threats.
Phishing in Microsoft Teams. Use these protections. Microsoft Teams allows external users to initiate chats by default, which can be exploited for phishing attacks. Attackers may impersonate help desks to trick users into compromising their accounts. To protect against this, you can lock down external chats to only allow whitelisted domains, uninstall unnecessary remote access tools, and ensure tamper protection is enabled.
☁️Noteworthy (long)reads
Microsoft sues service for creating illicit content with its AI platform. Microsoft is taking legal action against individuals involved in a “hacking-as-a-service” scheme. The scheme bypassed safety measures in Microsoft’s AI services to create harmful content. It compromised legitimate customer accounts and sold access through a now-shuttered site.
Remote Work Loneliness: How To Connect With Your Colleagues. Feeling isolated while working remotely is common, affecting many employees. To rebuild connections, consider small, consistent interactions like sharing personal stories or hobbies in group chats or meetings. Tools like Donut and Twine can help spark social conversations.
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☁️On a Less Serious Note
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