Mobile Access
Mobile Access has one baseline: the tenant’s Default Mobile Device Mailbox Policy. Exchange Online applies it over Exchange ActiveSync to any mailbox without a more specific policy, which in most tenants Octiga manages means every mailbox.
Why it matters
A phone’s built-in mail app is one of the most common ways people reach company email, and phones are easy to lose. Without a mailbox policy behind it, ActiveSync syncs mail, contacts and calendar to a device with no passcode, no encryption, and no way to wipe it remotely if it’s lost or stolen. Because this is the tenant’s default policy, setting it once protects every phone that connects from then on, not only the ones someone remembered to configure by hand.
How Microsoft evaluates it
A mobile device mailbox policy is an Exchange Online object with its own settings: whether a password is required, minimum password length and complexity, device and storage-card encryption, inactivity lock timeout, and whether non-provisionable devices (ones that can’t enforce every setting) can connect at all. It applies to a mailbox when a device tries to connect over Exchange ActiveSync. Every tenant has one default policy, assigned automatically to any mailbox without its own; a device is evaluated against it, and against Exchange’s separate mobile device access rules, each time it checks in. (Microsoft Learn: Mobile device mailbox policies in Exchange Online)
What end users experience
The first time a user connects their phone’s mail app to a mailbox this policy covers, they’re asked to set a device passcode (or meet whatever else the policy requires) before sync completes. It’s part of setting up the connection, not a separate warning. A device that can’t meet the policy, or is disallowed as non-provisionable, can’t connect at all rather than connecting with less protection. A device that already meets the policy sees no change when it’s applied or tightened; the prompt appears only for a newly connecting device, or one that no longer meets a stricter requirement.
| Baseline | Scope | Licence |
|---|---|---|
| Default Mobile Device Mailbox Policy | Tenant | — |