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Hawkins Release – Content Summary

Announcements, Release Notes Habiba Tabasum

The NHSmail Portal release is named in honour of Clare Hawkins, Head of Nursing at NHS Cambridgeshire and Peterborough ICB, who was awarded a British Empire Medal (BEM) for her services during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Please find below a summary of the main content of the Hawkins release which was deployed on 21/02/2024. To view the full release notes for this release please see the PDF file at the end of this summary.

BAU Functionality – Product Backlog Items

  • 82569- Removal of MFA Enablement via Per User within the NHSmail Portal

In line with Microsoft guidance, we are updating the way MFA is enabled for users. Currently, MFA is enabled Per-User, however, this is being deprecated and the recommended replacement is to use Conditional Access policies. As part of this PBI, the following scenarios will add users to a Standard Conditional Access policy that enables MFA:

    • User creation
    • Admin role assignment
    • MFA self-enablement
    • LA Enablement
    • Marked as Compromised accounts.
    • Application to User account conversion
    • ATP group membership
    • Resecured accounts
  • 82605- Re-enrolment Azure MFA to consider Conditional Access and Per User MFA

As part of this PBI, the ‘Re-enroll Azure MFA’ button will be available for users who have MFA enabled through Conditional Access. When the button is selected, authentication methods are removed from the user so that they are prompted to reset these upon next login.

It will remain the same for users who have Per User MFA.

  • 82621- Align MFA function buttons with MFA Status of a user

As part of this PBI, the logic behind all MFA related buttons has been updated to consider users who have MFA enabled through Conditional Access. Currently, all MFA buttons in Portal only cater for Per User MFA so this change is a dependency to PBI 82569.

BAU Functionality – Bug Fixes

  • 80535- M365 E5 License missing from Azure Phone System Queue

As part of this bug fix, the Microsoft E5 license will become a supported license type for NHSmail Teams Phone System. This license includes phone system standard licensing so does not require additional add-on licenses to utilise Direct Routing on the NHSmail central tenant for phone system features.

  • 85798- Audio Conferencing application turned off on policy updates

As part of this bug fix, the service plan toggles associated with the Dial-In Conferencing license will remain on unless an update is made to switched them off.

To view the full release note please refer to the PDF file.

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