Category Archives: Uncategorized

Microsoft Entra update

At the end of May 2022 Microsoft introduced us to Microsoft Entra – a new product family encompassing all of Microsoft’s identity and access capabilities (https://bit.ly/3SEMXDA). There are three members of the family with Azure AD remaining the hero identity and access management product, alongside two new product categories: Cloud Infrastructure Entitlement Management (CIEM) and decentralized identity.

With the acquisition of CloudKnox Security in 2021, Microsoft now offers a CIEM solution as part of Entra called Microsoft Entra Permissions Management. This was made generally available in July 2022 (https://bit.ly/3PdAF2f) and is licensed as a standalone solution costing $125 per resource per year, where supported resources are compute resources, container clusters, serverless functions, and databases across AWS, Azure, and GCP.

The decentralized identity solution, Microsoft Entra Verified ID, was made generally available in August 2022 (https://bit.ly/3SQSyae) and is included with any Azure AD subscription, including Azure AD Free. If you’re new to this notion, then there’s a nice video explaining decentralized identity here: https://bit.ly/3paTuso.

In terms of learning more, if you’re a partner, then this Inspire session (https://bit.ly/3BfNea3) is a good introduction to Entra, and of course there’s the main product page here: https://bit.ly/3P7VGLK, with links to lots more product information.

Microsoft 365 E3 – Unattended Licensing Brief

There’s an updated (June 2022) Microsoft 365 E3 – Unattended Licensing Brief. This document helps you to understand how the Microsoft 365 E3 – Unattended licence allows a bot to run repetitive tasks in a Windows client/Office app without user intervention, with a useful FAQ section at the end.

This updated version has minor changes updating it for Windows 11, and you can find it here: https://bit.ly/3QcSijt.

Dynamics 365 Licensing Guide

There’s an updated (August 2022) Dynamics 365 Licensing Guide. The changes in this new version are minor, with the most significant being the increase of Dataverse capacity entitlements for Operations-Activity and Operations-Device licences. Page 42 is updated to show that each Operations-Activity licence now accrues an additional 64 MB of Dataverse Database capacity and 512 MB of Dataverse File capacity, while each Operations-Device licence accrues 102 MB of Dataverse Database capacity and 819 MB of Dataverse File capacity.

You can  find details of further minor changes in the Change Log on page 60, and the updated document itself here: https://bit.ly/3SkWnnz.

Updates to the Frontline Worker device rules

Microsoft adjust the rules for devices used by Frontline Workers. From 1 August 2022, Office 365 F3 and Microsoft 365 F1/F3 licences may be assigned to users who use a primary work device with a single screen smaller than 10.9″ – increased from 10.1″. 

Find notice of the update on the Product Terms site here: https://bit.ly/3prduoo.

Updates to the Home Use Program

The Home Use Program is renamed to the Workplace Discount Program, but there are no changes to the offers that are available to eligible organisations.

You can find out more about the Workplace Discount Program here: https://bit.ly/3Qb7AFx, and notice of the name change on the Product Terms site here: https://bit.ly/3prduoo.

Windows Autopatch

Microsoft announce the General Availability of Windows Autopatch – a cloud service that automates updates for Windows, Microsoft 365 Apps for enterprise, Edge and Teams.

It’s included with Windows 10/11 Enterprise E3/E5/VDA licences, and customers also need to be licensed for Azure Active Directory Premium and Microsoft Intune to take advantage of the service.

You can find the announcement here: https://bit.ly/3vcQMWq, and a useful FAQ here: https://bit.ly/3S7o1o9.

Microsoft Defender for Business servers preview

Microsoft announce that Defender for Business servers is now in preview, offering endpoint security for Windows and Linux servers for small and medium-sized businesses. It’s free during this preview period and will then be charged at $3 per server instance per month at General Availability, when it will be available as an Add-on licence to Microsoft 365 Business Premium or Microsoft Defender for Business.

Find the announcement here: https://bit.ly/3RZ7TVO, and a useful FAQ here: https://bit.ly/3BhF3d3.

Microsoft Cloud for Sustainability

Microsoft announce the June 1 General Availability of Microsoft Cloud for Sustainability.

It’s a solution that works across multiple industries to help an organisation to accelerate their sustainability progress towards net-zero emissions.

The new Microsoft Sustainability Manager helps customers to create a single and actionable view of their sustainability data, and is available through an EA or CSP costing $4,000 per tenant per month.

You can find a pricing datasheet on Microsoft Sustainability Manager here: https://bit.ly/3u4V1TG, and the GA announcement here: https://bit.ly/3OozVrt.

Microsoft Defender for Individuals

Microsoft expand the Microsoft Defender family with Microsoft Defender for Individuals.

This is an online security application for Microsoft 365 Personal and Family subscribers, and is available across Windows, macOS, iOS, and Android. Licensed users simply sign in, and once their Microsoft 365 credentials are validated, they are granted access to Microsoft Defender.

Find the product announcement here: https://bit.ly/3yntqzw, and learn more about the Microsoft Defender product family here: https://bit.ly/3ymw7RM.