Play of the Week

Microsoft is introducing additional recommended actions to provide guidance on fine-tuning your insider risk policies and implementing advanced configurations starting in January 2024. These new tasks and journeys will be accessible through the Recommended Actions page for GCC, GCCH, DoD, and commercial tenants.

In Development

Outlook: [Android] Customizable Compose Toolbar and Drawer

Now while writing an email, you can reorder tools to customize your experience and make your most used actions even easier to reach.

ID: 100692 Release: Outlook – DoD, Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant), GCC High, GCC Tags: November CY2023

Microsoft 365: Israel datacenter region and Advanced Data Residency availability

Microsoft 365 will launch a new local cloud region in Israel. The Advanced Data Residency add-on (“ADR”) will be available in Israel and provide eligible customers with committed data residency in the Israel local cloud region, prioritized tenant migration services, and expanded coverage of Microsoft 365 workloads and Customer Data.

ID: 149270 Release: Microsoft 365 – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant) Tags: December CY2023

Outlook: Estimating the Cost of Optical Character Recognition (OCR) for Exchange Online, Microsoft Teams, SharePoint, OneDrive and EndPoint

With OCR cost estimator, without incurring any bill and without providing azure subscription, admins will be able to estimate how much they will pay once they turn “ON” the OCR configuration for the selected locations and scope.

ID: 160009 Release: Microsoft Purview compliance portal – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant) Tags: January CY2024

Microsoft Teams: Collaborative Notes in Channel Meetings

Collaborative Notes will replace Wiki-based Channel Meeting Notes. Collaborative Notes in channel meetings allow attendees to co-create and collaborate on their meeting agenda, notes, and action items. Since Collaborative Notes are a Loop component, it is always in sync regardless of how many places they live in. Assigned Tasks in Collaborative Notes automatically sync with To Do and Planner.

ID: 167330 Release: Microsoft Teams – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant) Tags: December CY2023

Outlook: Conditional Formatting in New Outlook for Windows and Web

Conditional formatting is a feature to make messages that meet defined conditions stand out in the message list by using different font colors. The users can specify conditions that an incoming message should meet, such as a sender’s name or email address.

ID: 167976 Release: Outlook – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant) Tags: December CY2023

Microsoft Teams: Redirect incoming call directly to voicemail from incoming call notification

Allows users to easily redirect an incoming call to voicemail without having to accept or reject the call when receiving calls on a Teams certified phone device.

ID: 169887 Release: Microsoft Teams – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant), GCC, GCC High, DoD Tags: March CY2024

Microsoft Teams: Domain-specific search

Users will be able to narrow down their search results and find what they are looking for faster. Get more precise search results by picking up a specific domain like files, group chat or Teams and channels. You can also search files or group chats by entering a person name.

ID: 181285 Release: Microsoft Teams – GCC, Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant) Tags: December CY2023

Microsoft Teams: New Teams meeting templates added to Outlook Teams add-in

New meeting templates for Virtual Appointment, Webinar, and Town hall are available in the Teams meeting dropdown menu in the Calendar tab in Outlook with the Outlook Teams add-in enabled. This allows organizers to set up these broader Teams meeting scenarios directly within Outlook and these will show up on calendars in both Outlook and Teams apps.

ID: 181621 Release: Microsoft Teams, Outlook – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant), GCC Tags: December CY2023

Microsoft Teams: Remove items from your activity feed

Users will be able to remove items they no longer need from their activity feed, helping the user stay on top of their notifications.

ID: 181794 Release: Microsoft Teams – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant), GCC High, DoD, GCC Tags: December CY2023

Microsoft Purview compliance portal: Data Loss Prevention – Protection of password protected, Unscannable and partially scannable documents on SharePoint

Three new predicates for Microsoft Purview DLP for SharePoint to help protect password protected, unscannable, and partially scannable documents.

ID: 183514 Release: Microsoft Purview compliance portal – GCC, GCC High Tags: November CY2023

Microsoft Purview compliance portal: Information Protection – Exchange Auto-labeling supports non-mail enable security groups

Service side auto-labeling now supports scoping of exchange auto-labeling to non-mail enabled security groups.

ID: 184908 Release: Microsoft Purview compliance portal – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant) Tags: November CY2023

Microsoft Defender for Office 365: False positive email release from Quarantine through threat explorer, email summary panel, and email entity page take action

SecOps can now mange False positives and take move to inbox (i.e. release) quarantined messages from Threat explorer and Email entity page without the need to tab out to the Quarantine portal to take the action.

ID: 184915 Release: Microsoft Defender for Office 365 – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant) Tags: December CY2023

Outlook: Global Address List updates in new Outlook for Windows and Outlook on the Web

We are making some adjustments to the GAL search and browse experiences. Users will be asked to type in more characters to refine their search in some cases. There will be some other visual improvements in error messaging. Another way to find recipients is by using the suggestion dropdown picker in the To/Cc/Bcc lines.

ID: 185475 Release: Outlook – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant), DoD, GCC, GCC High Tags: November CY2023

Microsoft Defender for Office 365: Attack Simulation Training in DoD

Attack simulation and training (AST) in the Microsoft Defender for Office 365 is an intelligent risk reduction tool, which allows customers to run realistic attack scenarios in their organization, identify vulnerable users, and help drive behavior change through an integrated security awareness training program. It is to be made available in the DoD environment.

ID: 185568 Release: Microsoft Defender for Office 365 – DoD Tags: January CY2024

Microsoft Search: Microsoft Graph connector crawl failure notifications in Service Health dashboard

Admins get a notification in the Service Health dashboard when Microsoft Graph connectors crawl fails.

ID: 185811 Release: Microsoft Search, Microsoft 365 Copilot – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant) Tags: November CY2023

Microsoft Project: Additional capabilities for Microsoft 365 users in Microsoft Project for the web

Currently, users with Microsoft 365 licenses can view projects shared with them by users of Microsoft Project for the web. This update will enable Microsoft 365 users to collaborate more seamlessly with Project users by editing shared projects. The added capabilities enable Microsoft 365 users to access any functionality where Microsoft Planner and Microsoft Project for the web overlap. Note: This feature is specific to projects that are created within the default environment, such as by using project.microsoft.com.

ID: 186228 Release: Microsoft Project – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant) Tags: December CY2023

Outlook: Cloud-based Message Recall on Outlook on the Web and the New Outlook for Windows for GCC, GCC High, and DoD

We will be enabling Cloud-based Message Recall on Outlook on the Web and the New Outlook for Windows, a feature that is already available in world-wide multitenant, for customers in GCC, GCC High, and DoD.

ID: 186547 Release: Exchange, Outlook – DoD, GCC, GCC High Tags: November CY2023

Microsoft Purview compliance portal: Insider Risk Management- Recommended actions for finetuning policies

We are introducing additional recommended actions to provide guidance on fine-tuning your insider risk policies and implementing advanced configurations. These new tasks and journeys will be accessible through the Recommended Actions page. Microsoft Purview Insider Risk Management correlates various signals to identify potential malicious or inadvertent insider risks, such as IP theft, data leakage, and security violations. Insider Risk Management enables customers to create policies based on their own internal policies, governance, and organizational requirements. Built with privacy by design, users are pseudonymized by default, and role-based access controls and audit logs are in place to help ensure user-level privacy.

ID: 186580 Release: Microsoft Purview compliance portal – GCC High, GCC, DoD, Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant) Tags: January CY2024

Microsoft Purview compliance portal: Insider Risk Management- Browsed to generative AI websites indicator

With this update, we are adding a new indicator, “browsed to generative AI sites,” for the risky browser usage policy template, giving visibility into organizational usage of generative AI domains. User information is pseudonymized by default with strong privacy controls in place to protect end user trust. While visiting one of these AI domains may be authorized by an organization, this indicator is designed to help ensure they are correctly accounting for whether and how, these sites may be accessed in policies. Microsoft Purview Insider Risk Management correlates various signals to identify potential malicious or inadvertent insider risks, such as IP theft, data leakage, and security violations. Insider Risk Management enables customers to create policies based on their own internal policies, governance, and organizational requirements. Built with privacy by design, users are pseudonymized by default, and role-based access controls and audit logs are in place to help ensure user-level privacy.

ID: 186584 Release: Microsoft Purview compliance portal – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant) Tags: January CY2024

Rolling Out

SharePoint: Out-of-the-box document library templates

We are bringing the goodness of List templates to SharePoint document libraries. Creating document libraries will now be a breeze with our ready-made templates with scenario relevant content, structure, metadata, and content types – all to save you time and maintain broader consistency across your content management organization.

ID: 124879 Release: SharePoint – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant), GCC High, DoD, GCC Tags: November CY2023

Microsoft Purview compliance portal: Data Loss Prevention – Extend DLP controls to Firefox browser (U.S. Government clouds)

With this update, you will be able to extend the Microsoft Purview DLP controls to Firefox browsers. DLP admins will be able to set policies to prevent exfiltration of sensitive information through the Firefox browser by preventing actions such as copying data from a sensitive document to another document using the Clipboard, printing a sensitive document, copying to USB removeable media, or copying to a network share.

ID: 138590 Release: Microsoft Purview compliance portal – DoD, GCC High, GCC Tags: November CY2023

Outlook: MIP Label Support for Events

Tenants who have setup MIP sensitivity labels for use on events will now have support in Outlook for Android to both read and write labels to their meetings with enforcement of rules such as encryption as defined by tenant admins.

ID: 163358 Release: Outlook – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant), GCC, DoD, GCC High Tags: November CY2023

Microsoft Teams: Workflows Message Extension: New Default Actions

The Microsoft Teams Workflows Message Extension will include new default actions to assist user collaboration. These actions will simplify collaboration within a conversation by enabling users to kick off common workflows and post adaptive cards to conversations.

ID: 167324 Release: Microsoft Teams – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant) Tags: November CY2023

Microsoft Teams Rooms on Windows All-in-one experience

With this update, Teams Rooms on Windows will support all-in-one and board device form factors, such as the Surface Hub 3.

ID: 170740 Release: Microsoft Teams – GCC, Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant), GCC High Tags: November CY2023

Microsoft Teams: Synced updates for Microsoft Teams Rooms on Android devices and paired consoles.

When Microsoft Teams Rooms on Android devices are updated from the Teams Admin Center, their paired consoles will get updated in tandem, ensuring a seamless experience.

ID: 174344 Release: Microsoft Teams – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant), GCC Tags: December CY2023

OneDrive: Add individual file shortcuts in OneDrive for Web

This feature will let you create a shortcut to files stored in other people’s OneDrive and document libraries to be able to easily find it within your OneDrive. These file shortcuts can be moved, renamed, or deleted without impacting the source content, and they will show up in OneDrive for Web, Android, iOS, and sync client endpoints.

ID: 177873 Release: OneDrive – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant), GCC, GCC High, DoD Tags: November CY2023

OneDrive: Access Microsoft Lists, Power BI, Loop and Whiteboard content in OneDrive for Web

You will be able to easily find and open your Microsoft Lists, Loops, Power BI dashboards and Whiteboard content in OneDrive for Web. If you have recently opened, shared, or favorited one of these files, then it will appear in your Recent, Shared, and Favorites views in OneDrive for Web.

ID: 177877 Release: OneDrive – GCC High, GCC, Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant) Tags: November CY2023

Microsoft Purview compliance portal: Audit – New Stream Logs for Microsoft Purview Audit Standard Users

Microsoft Purview is expanding access to wider cloud security activity events for Microsoft Stream. As part of the changes, standard users of Purview Audit will begin to generate 5 new Microsoft Stream events that were previously generated only for Audit Premium licensed users. The following events will now be provided for all Audit Standard users: 1. StreamInvokeGetTranscript; 2. StreamInvokeChannelView; 3. StreamInvokeGettExtTrack; 4. StreamInvokeGetVideo; 5. StreamInvokeGroupView

ID: 180738 Release: Microsoft Purview compliance portal – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant) Tags: November CY2023

Microsoft Purview compliance portal: Audit – New Yammer / Viva Engage Logs for Microsoft Purview Audit Standard Users

Microsoft Purview is expanding access to wider cloud security events for Microsoft Viva Engage (formerly known as Yammer). As part of the changes, standard users of Purview Audit will begin to generate 6 new Microsoft Viva Engage events that were previously generated only for Audit Premium licensed users. The following events will now be provided for all Audit Standard users: 1. ThreadViewed; 2. ThreadAccessFailure; 3. MessageUpdated; 4. FileAccessFailure; 5. MessageCreation; 6. GroupAccessFailure

ID: 180740 Release: Microsoft Purview compliance portal – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant) Tags: November CY2023

Microsoft Teams: Teams Connect shared channels in GCCH & DoD

Work seamlessly and securely with those inside and outside your organization. With Microsoft Teams shared channels, multiple organizations can work together in a shared space – have conversations, schedule a meeting, share, and co-author files, and collaborate on apps, without ever switching tenants.

ID: 180742 Release: Microsoft Teams – DoD, GCC High Tags: November CY2023

Microsoft Purview compliance portal: new roles added for built-in Compliance Administrator, Information Protection, and Privacy Management related role groups.

Microsoft Purview provides a unified solution for managing data security, governance, compliance, and privacy across your organization’s landscape. Microsoft Purview built-in role groups are being extended with new roles to prepare for upcoming features and capabilities relevant to those role groups. Additional roles will be added to Microsoft Purview built-in role groups for Compliance Administrator, Information Protection related role groups, and Privacy Management related role groups. This change will not disrupt the current capabilities for these role groups, it will enable admins in these built-in groups to manage additional data types in the future.

ID: 184899 Release: Microsoft Purview compliance portal – GCC High, GCC, DoD, Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant) Tags: November CY2023

Launched

Microsoft Teams: Immersive spaces in Microsoft Teams

Immersive spaces in Teams makes it easier for Teams users to transform their meetings into a 3D experience. With just one click, you can connect with your team in a pre-built immersive space right from the view menu in Teams meetings.

ID: 161720 Release: Microsoft Teams – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant) Tags: January CY2024

Microsoft Purview compliance portal: Information Protection – Advanced Fingerprinting

Document Fingerprinting in Microsoft Purview Data Loss Prevention (DLP) converts a standard form into a sensitive information type (SIT), which you can use in the rules of your DLP policies. This update extends support for Fingerprint-based SITs to additional workloads, including SharePoint, OneDrive, Teams, and Endpoint and enables admins to adjust threshold while creating Fingerprint SITs. This also allows you to detect when a portion of your sensitive document is exposed using partial matching support with Fingerprinting across the compliance solutions.

ID: 164203 Release: Microsoft Purview compliance portal – DoD, GCC High, GCC Tags: November CY2023

Microsoft Teams: Desktop to web browser join experience for attendees in Virtual Appointments

Schedulers can enable the ‘have attendees join from a web browser’ setting so that attendees joining the virtual appointment on desktop will be routed to the Teams web browser experience. This allows attendees to have access to engagement features including raise hand and live reactions.

ID: 165485 Release: Microsoft Teams – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant) Tags: November CY2023

Whiteboard: Copilot in Whiteboard

Copilot in Whiteboard helps you kickstart and accelerate your ideation process to generate, categorize, and summarize your ideas.

ID: 180186 Release: Microsoft 365 Copilot, Whiteboard – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant) Tags: November CY2023

Microsoft 365 app: Copilot in Microsoft 365 Loop

Copilot in Loop helps you unlock the power of shared thinking—co-create, get up to speed, and stay in sync with your teammates. Now you can iterate with Copilot collaboratively as a team, co-create prompts, generate tables to help organize team projects, catch up where your teammates left off, summarize page content, and generate a recap for a teammate you’re handing work off to.

ID: 180191 Release: Microsoft 365 Copilot, Microsoft 365 app – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant) Tags: November CY2023

Microsoft 365 Copilot: Microsoft 365 Chat

Your single destination to take on any task. It combines the power of Large Language Models with your work content and context, and other apps, to help you draft content, catch up on what you missed, and get answers to questions via open prompts. It’s available via multiple surfaces, including microsoft365.com, Teams, and Bing.

ID: 180204 Release: Microsoft 365 Copilot – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant) Tags: November CY2023

Canceled

Microsoft Teams: Enabling People Recognition in a Teams Meeting with a desktop client face enrollment process

This item has been cancelled due to duplication. Users will be able to enroll their face and create a face profile using the new enrollment process in the Teams desktop client. The face profile is used in Teams Rooms meetings where an Intelligent Camera capable of People Recognition is deployed to recognize in-room attendees, and then labels their identity for all meeting participants, both in-room and remote.

ID: 161426 Release: Microsoft Teams – Worldwide (Standard Multi-Tenant), GCC Tags: December CY2023