How to Disable IMAP, POP, and SMTP Protocols Across your Organization - Basic Auth Deprecation Exchange Online

Microsoft will start disabling Basic Authentication for protocols in October 01st, 2022 and will be permanently disabled by January 2023 in all customers tenants.

• If you are using Microsoft accounts in other service providers or devices that works with Basic Auth, please consider changing your configuration to Option 2: Direct Send or Option 3: SMTP relay as per need to prevent disruption with your email service. https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/exchange/mail-flow-best-practices/how-to-set-up-a-multifunction-device-or-application-to-send-email-using-microsoft-365-or-office-365 

Opting out from getting Basic Auth automatically disabled:

You can still opt out from getting Basic Authentication automatically disabled until September 30th, 2022. This will keep basic authentication enabled until January 2023. Follow the steps below if you want to opt out: 

1. Open the Microsoft 365 admin center
2.  Click the green Help & support button in the lower right-hand corner of the screen.
3. Enter the phrase “Diag: Enable Basic Auth in EXO" and follow the prompts. 

Re-enabling a protocol with Basic Authentication if you did not opt out

If after October 1st you still need to use any of the protocols with Basic Authentication, you can re-enable it once using the Self Service diagnostic. Please keep in mind that it will be permanently disabled by January 2023.

1. Open the Microsoft 365 admin center
2.  Click the green Help & support button in the lower right-hand corner of the screen.
3. Enter the phrase “Diag: Enable Basic Auth in EXO" and follow the prompts. 

Customers with tenants in the Government Community Cloud (GCC) are unable to use the self-service diagnostic covered here. Those tenants may opt out by following the process contained in the Message Center post sent to their tenant. If GCC customers need to re-enable a protocol following the Oct 1^stdeadline they will need to open a support ticket.

How to disable Basic Authentication and protocols

Find below the instructions on how to disable Basic Authentication for IMAP, POP, and other Exchange protocols across your organization, if not yet disabled.

1. Open the M365 Admin portal https://admin.microsoft.com;
2. Go to Settings -> Org Settings ->Modern authentication
3. Enable the option Turn on modern authentication for Outlook 2013 for Windows and later
4. Uncheck all protocols under Allow access to basic authentication protocols
5. Save the changes.