As part of its Secure Future Initiative (SFI), Microsoft has announced it is deprecating Basic Authentication for personal Outlook accounts.

Microsoft has been working to improve security across its products and services following a series of devastating breaches that impacted customers in the individual, corporate, and government space. Outlook personal accounts are receiving an upgrade too, with the company enforcing Modern Authentication.

Starting September 16th, Microsoft personal email account users (e.g. Outlook.com, Hotmail.com, Live.com) will need to move to Modern Authentication methods in their email application. These will be necessary for all Outlook users.

To help keep Outlook personal email accounts secure, starting September 16, 2024, Microsoft will no longer support Basic Auth, the method in which a person provides only their username and password to sign into their account. As of September 16, 2024, Outlook will require that all those with a Microsoft email account use a mail or calendar app or the Outlook.com website which supports modern auth, such as the latest versions of Outlook, Apple Mail, or Thunderbird.

The company also reminded users that its Mail & Calendar apps will stop being supported by the end of 2024, and the light version of the Outlook web app will be deprecated August 19, 2024.

Last year we launched a new version of the Outlook for Windows application, which brings Outlook to everyone on Windows – for free. We’ve seen millions of people move into the new Outlook for Windows since our launch, putting it on par for consumer usage with our classic Outlook for Windows app – in a much shorter time. Most people who were using Mail and Calendar have migrated to Outlook for Windows.

With the evolving cyberthreat landscape and our commitment to providing the most secure email experience to our customers, we want to remind people that the Mail and Calendar apps will no longer be supported or available in the Microsoft Store by the end of 2024.

While these changes will no doubt cause some inconvenience, the move is a good one on Microsoft’s part and should help protect Outlook users.