Low-Down on Office 365

Last week, Microsoft rolled out its promised “Unverified Sender” enhancement to Office 365 to help users “identify suspicious messages” (i.e. spam or phishing emails) that reach the Outlook inbox. ¹ This comes after a bulletin in which Microsoft urged Office 365 administrators and users to not turn off its built-in spam filters to “minimize the potential of a data breach or a compromised account.” ²

Many users are mistaken that there are different kinds of protections to their data in the cloud. But the risks of data loss or compromised data are no less of a problem in the cloud than in a modern server, desktop or phone.

As an example, think your Office 365 files are recoverable if they are mistakenly deleted? You might be led to think so by the fact that Office 365 has one of the most robust backup programs on the planet, with redundancies across the globe. But those redundancies are concerned not with your documents, but with Office 365’s availability. Microsoft promises 99.9% uptime for its service, not that you’ll have access to previous versions of your documents — before a major edit, before an accidental deletion, before a ransomware attack.

Office 365’s terms and conditions read: “it’s your data. You own it. You control it. And it is yours to take with you if you decide to leave the service.” Microsoft’s message is it may be in the cloud, but it remains your data, your responsibility to ensure it’s appropriately protected. ³

If you’re in need of a solution, Bryley can help you to have peace-of-mind that your business’s data in the cloud is backed-up and accessible every day. Reach Bryley at 978-562-6077 Option 2 or email ITExperts@bryley.com

1 https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/security/office-365-security/unverified-sender-feature

2 https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/microsoft/microsoft-warns-against-bypassing-office-365-spam-filters/

3 https://spanning.com/blog/are-you-at-risk-for-data-loss-in-office-365/