Office Modern Authentication

Some Office 365 ProPlus applications can use multifactor authentication and single sign-on. The capabilities use a client component that ships in Office 365 ProPlus and is also available for other Office 2013 and Office 2016 suites for Windows. The so-called modern authentication component could enhance security in many organizations with Office users, and it could be particularly useful for Office 365 multifactor authentication. The screen shot here shows what will probably be a common use of the component: an Outlook user entering a second factor (a numeric code received by text message) to sign in to Exchange Online.

Multifactor authentication can enhance security and may be mandated in some organizations. Office 365 has enabled multifactor authentication for some time, but Outlook and other Office applications did not work with it, so users had to employ the more limited Outlook Web App browser interface or maintain app passwords to bypass multifactor authentication.

The new authentication component works with identity providers and services through the Active Directory Authentication Library (ADAL) client software. ADAL works with Office 365 and Azure multifactor authentication, SAML 2.0 passive authentication (a widely used protocol for single sign-on), and smart cards and certificates.