Reminder! Microsoft will soon retire Operator Assistance in Azure MFA this month
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Still using Operator Assistance in Azure multifactor authentication (MFA)? Well, you may want to stay for a while for this important reminder.
Microsoft will be retiring Operator Assistance in Azure MFA on September 30, 2023. This means that the feature will no longer be available after that date.
“Before that date, please start using the automated attendant functionality within your phone system which provides a frictionless and more secure connection experience,” says Microsoft.
Operator Assistance is a feature that allows users to receive multifactor authentication phone calls and have the call transferred to an operator. This can be helpful in situations where the user is not able to answer the call themselves, such as if they are in a meeting or if they are hearing impaired.
However, Operator Assistance can also delay call connection and can result in incomplete multifactor authentication attempts. For this reason, Microsoft is retiring the feature and recommending that users start using the automated attendant functionality within their phone system.
“When Operator Assistance retires on 30 September 2023, this feature will be disabled for all Azure AD tenants. Azure AD will automatically dial the appropriate user extension upon call connection. New Azure AD tenants created after 1 March 2022 will not have access to the Operator Assistance feature,” the announcement adds.
