Active Directory and Microsoft 365 Account Provisioning And User Lifecycle Management: Hidden Costs and Recommendations
At its core, user provisioning is a process that makes sure that user accounts are created, given the most appropriate level of permissions and managed moving forward across an enterprise. Keep in mind, however, that these days most Microsoft environments, in particular, are hybrid, meaning that they have both on-premises Active Directory components and Azure […]
Azure Active Directory Security Defaults—not for everyone
Microsoft’s powerful array of cloud offerings—Microsoft Azure, Dynamics, and Office 365—offer paths to business growth without the huge capital investment. Most organizations on the cusp of implementing and experimenting with those services may not make security the first priority in the quest for productivity. The first phase of the exciting journey into the cloud is to […]
Microsoft Azure AD Single Sign-on Now Free to Customers
Microsoft announced any customer using a subscription of a commercial online service can connect all their cloud applications to Azure AD for single sign-on (SSO), and protect this access with multi-factor authentication (MFA) as a security default at no extra cost. SSO reduces the number of sign-in prompts for employees and enables one-click access to popular apps, and it should […]
8 Truths and Tips: Avoiding Outages in Azure Active Directory and Hybrid AD
Unfortunately, Active Directory data loss (in Azure, on-premises and in hybrid environments) is a harsh reality for many organizations, especially as threat of malicious actors breaching AD is on the rise. These business-critical services must be protected from costly outages and threats, which can stop users from getting to email, important documents and applications. While […]
A New Major Version of Azure AD Connect Has Been Released
Integrating your on-premises directories with Azure AD makes your users more productive by providing a common identity for accessing both cloud and on-premises resources. With this integration users and organizations can take advantage of the following: Organizations can provide users with a common hybrid identity across on-premises or cloud-based services leveraging Windows Server Active Directory […]
Is your Active Directory security relying on a single check-box?
Don’t trust your Active Directory Security to a single check-box! Trusting the disable check box in Active Directory is risky if additional steps are not taken to ensure the the user account will not be re-enabled with unintended (possibly disastrous) consequences. Often the best practice steps are overlooked or not followed because of the additional […]
Are You Still Manually Provisioning New Users in Hybrid Active Directory/Office 365?
Are You Still Manually Provisioning New Users in Hybrid Active Directory/Office 365? Microsoft estimates that 70% of organizations will run a hybrid environment of AD/Office 365 for at least some period of time. Many of these hybrid organizations will move to hybrid mode with the thought that they will manually provision new users. In Hybrid environments, this strategy deserves a second look because on-boarding accounts is […]
Cross-Platform PowerShell Core 6.0 Released
A More Powerful Shell As of January 10, PowerShell Core 6.0 is now available for general use in production environments. Not only is this version cross-platform, available for Windows, Linux, macOS, and a variety of less common OSes, but is also not even tied to Windows in particular, having been developed on the open source .NET Core platform. A comprehensive analysis by Kurt Mackie goes […]
10 signs an Active Directory Management Tool is a Dinosaur!
Existing Active Directory tools were created more than ten years ago – before AD hybrid became a mission critical enterprise requirement. Vendors made things worse by failing to improve and evolve their products turning them into big, unwieldy and expensive dinosaurs headed for extinction. Customers know replacing a tool takes work, but the rewards can be astonishing. Updating enterprise AD Management tools […]
Exchange 2016 Active Directory schema changes
Exchange 2016 Active Directory schema changes Exchange Server 2016 adds several new schema changes to Active Directory. Classes, Attributes, Indexes, GC attributes and object IDs should be reviewed carfully to fully understand what will be changed in your Active Directory. Read more on TechNet about Exchange 2016 Active Directory schema changes here…
