Items tagged with outlook
The psychics at Microsoft are working on implementing a predicative text feature to the web version of Outlook. As you begin composing an email, the feature will attempt at what you most likely are aiming to write, and will "suggest words for phrases" that you can quickly input if applicable, or of course ignore if they miss the mark. When typing a message and suggested text appears, users can press the Tab key or the Right arrow key to roll with the crystal ball prediction. Otherwise, users can effectively ignore the suggested text by simply continuing to type their message, at which point the suggested text will take the hint and perform a disappearing act. It remains to be seen how well it...
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Microsoft's Windows 10 operating system has been plagued with numerous bugs recently, but one issue in particular is frustrating a large segment of its customer base. As we all well now, COVID-19/coronavirus has necessitated that many Americans work from home to adhere with quarantine guidelines. However, this particular Windows 10 bug is preventing some users from connecting to the internet with the apps they need most. For those that are working from home, and need to access their work system using a virtual private network (VPN), a recent cumulative update, KB4535996, is making those connections unstable. "Devices using a manual or auto-configured proxy, especially with a virtual...
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It turns out that a security breach affecting some users of Microsoft's Outlook.com, Hotmail.com, and MSN.com webmail services is worse than originally thought. In an email that was previously sent to users, Microsoft said a hacker managed to swipe a support agent's login credentials, potentially exposing email addresses, subject lines, and other information, but not the actual contents of any emails. As Maury Povich would say, 'That was a lie'. More accurately, that is not the full story. As far as we know, Microsoft did not actually lie to the users who received that specific email, in which the company admitted that email addresses, folder names, subject lines, and email recipient addresses...
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As if Microsoft’s Skype security exploit back in February wasn’t alarming enough, users of the company’s Outlook.com, MSN.com and Hotmail.com webmail services may have something to worry about now as well. Microsoft has confirmed to a number of sources, and according to users on reddit with specific documentation, that hackers compromised the company’s support portal, gaining access to email accounts on its Outlook service. The email sent out to users by Microsoft notes email addresses, folder names, subject lines of emails and email recipient addresses may have been exposed, but likely not the content of the emails themselves. The Microsoft Privacy Communication team’s...
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Office 365 is getting a facelift. Microsoft recently announced that it will release several updates for Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook. Microsoft’s goal with these changes is to offer users a more powerful and streamlined experience. Microsoft will initially release three updates. First, Office 365 will include a new “ribbon” that is cleaner and dedicates more space for collaboration. Users who tend to work more on their own or prefer to have most of the commands at their fingertips will still be able to expand the ribbon to the familiar three-line view. Microsoft argued that one of the reasons that it is allowing customers to keep the classic ribbon is because users “have...
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Microsoft has added new features to Outlook on Windows, Mac, web, and mobile devices. The software giant says that the changes are meant to help users manage their time and keep important stuff up front where it is easy to find. There are new features coming to Outlook for iOS and Android devices soon to help connect users to people, apps, and tech that improve productivity in the business environment. Among the changes are bill pay reminders in Outlook Calendar with the addition of bill payments to events that the calendar already tracks for users like travel reservations and package deliveries. Outlook can identify the bills you receive via email and then give a summary at the top of the message...
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When the topic of virtual reality, augmented reality or mixed reality comes up, one of the first things people think of is gaming. And that's fair, considering the high profile releases of headsets like the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive. However, there are applications outside the realm of gaming that hold some exciting possibilities for these emerging technologies, a notion Microsoft is reminding everyone of by bringing holographic experiences to Outlook Mail and Calendar. Both apps are now supported on HoloLens, Microsoft's AR headset that's currently in development. Microsoft is pitching these versions of Outlook Mail and Calendar as the first holographic email and calendaring apps in the world,...
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A few botched updates from Microsoft this week have us questioning their forced update strategy with Windows 10. If you've had issues logging into your Windows 7 computer, if Outlook is crashing randomly, or if you are unable to open documents from Sharepoint, the fixes are below. The troublesome KB's in question are KB3055034, KB3101521, and KB3097877.KB3055034 was actually released in October but most users probably haven't encountered any issues stemming from it because it seems to only break Office programs when files are opened from Sharepoint. We are covering it now because Microsoft has now released a superseding KB3101521 update which, well, still breaks Sharepoint...
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Microsoft is really stepping up the pace when it comes to delivering new builds of Windows 10 to Windows Insiders. And we should expect the new builds to quickly flowing from Microsoft’s tap considering that AMD’s CEO recently let it slip that Windows 10 will see its official retail release in July. The latest build that is now available to Windows 10 testers on the Fast Ring is Build 10061. There are a number of notable changes in Build 10061 including new Mail and Calendar apps. Mail includes a three-pane email UI and swipe gestures, and both apps support Exchange, Office 365, Outlook.com, Gmail, IMAP, and POP (people still use POP?). There have been improvements made to the overall Windows...
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With a full-throated "Me too!" targeted straight at Microsoft's recently-released Outlook app, Google yesterday upgraded their Gmail email app for Android to better support non-Google email accounts, including @yahoo and @outlook. Since last year users have been able to configure their other IMAP/Pop accounts to their Gmail for Android app, however, the app's somewhat shoddy design required users to switch between accounts to read and act on the content therein. With Gmail, Android users can now easily manage all the email from all of their accounts in a unified Inbox — the new "All Inboxes" option — in which they can view and respond to all of their email messages without needing...
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Microsoft Outlook is finally coming to iOS and Android – but in actually, we should really say that Acompli is coming to iOS and Android. Microsoft bought Acompli back in early December, and hailed the app, which “provides innovative ways to focus on what’s important in your inbox, to schedule meetings, and work with attachments and files.” Microsoft promised to take the best of what had been built into Acompli and combine it with the work already undertaken by its existing Outlook team. Outlook's calendar integration What we now have is a rebranded app that carries the Outlook name and gives users a powerful email and calendaring tool. It supports most major email services including Gmail, Yahoo!...
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Earlier this month, it was discovered that China was using man-in-the-middle (MITM) attacks against Microsoft Outlook and Mozilla Thunderbird email clients, as well as smartphone apps that use IMAP and SMTP protocols. Or did it? A spokesman for the Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC) claims the allegations that Chinese authorities hacked into Outlook are just "groundless slander." "The Chinese government is a staunch defender of the Internet's security, and resolutely opposes any form of cyberattack," the CAC said. Image Source: Flickr (Robert Scoble) Online censorship watchdog GreatFire.org pegged China's government as most likely being responsible, noting that "If our...
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China appears to be bringing the hammer down on American email services attempting to operate on its digital turf without officially banning them. The country briefly stole the cybervillian spotlight from North Korea last year when it allegedly crushed Gmail access for a long period of time. Now, according to watchdog GreatFire.org, Microsoft Outlook and Mozilla Thunderbird are experiencing a brutal man-in-the-middle (MITM) attack. GreatFire.org keeps an eye on sites it believe blocked by China. (Source: GreatFire.org)The MTIM attack affects email clients and apps that use IMAP and SMTP protocols. The hack can let attackers monitor emails. GreatFire.org reports that the Web-based...
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Just when Mac users might have thought Microsoft forgot all about them as it relates to productivity software, the Redmond software giant made a couple of big announcements that show otherwise. The first is there's a new and polished version of Outlook for Mac available, and the second is that Mac users can expect the next version of Office for Mac to come out next year. The latter might come as a surprise if you're familiar with Microsoft's release history. Typically Microsoft launches a new version of Office for Mac around 6-8 months after building a new version for Windows. Mac users have already waited a year and a half, so what gives? "Following the release of Office 365 we made the conscious...
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Ever since Edward Snowden leaked details on how the government had forced various IT companies to disclose information (or secured their willing cooperation), companies like Google, Facebook, and Microsoft have been desperate to regain their users' trust. Six months ago, Microsoft announced that it would reengineer its products and services to provide a much higher level of security -- today, the company revealed that its reached an important milestone in that process. As of now, Outlook.com uses TLS (Transport Layer Security) to provide end-to-end encryption for inbound and outbound email -- assuming that the provider on the other end also uses TLS. The TLS standard has been in the news fairly...
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Microsoft is reversing course on a recently updated privacy policy that specified it was within its legal right to sift through a user's Hotmail or Outlook email account if the company had reason to believe something illegal was taking place. From here on out, Microsoft will pass the buck to law enforcement officials rather than continue to catch heat from privacy advocates. The issue first came to light when Microsoft received information indicating an employee was providing stolen intellectual property, including code related to its activation process, to a French blogger known for trafficking such material for profit. As luck would have it, the blogger was a Hotmail user, so Microsoft infiltrated...
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Hackers claiming to represent the Syrian Electronic Army (SEA) decided to deface Skype's social media pages with disparaging messages about Microsoft and its digital properties. On Skype's Twitter page, for example, the hackers posted a status update telling followers not to use Microsoft's email services (Hotmail and Outlook) because "they are monitoring your accounts and selling the data to the governments." Skype eventually regained control of its Twitter account, but not before the restless bunch of hackers posted Steve Ballmer's contact information. It was followed by a message that read, "You can thank Microsoft for monitoring your accounts/emails using this details. #SEA." The SEA, if...
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It was about a year ago that Microsoft first launched its “Scroogled” anti-Google campaign that pointed a long crooked finger at the search giant’s Google Shopping practices. Although Microsoft’s various accusations against Google are technically valid, they’re not particularly damning in the sense that Google hasn’t made much of a secret of the fact that it places ads in Gmail and produces sponsored results on Google Shopping. Nevertheless, Microsoft is continuing its Scroogled campaign by launching the Scroogled store. Now you can buy hats, t-shirts, and mugs with the Scroogled logo and from-the-hip sayings and artwork--eg, a t-shirt with a large image of...
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It's hard to believe that this is a headline in 2013, given IMAP has been around for decades and is extremely useful, but when the company in question is wrapped into its own email protocol, it becomes a little less surprising. Simply put: If you use Outlook.com as your email provider, you now have the option of using IMAP, a protocol that gives you (nearly) real-time access to your email in an external client - eg: Mozilla Thunderbird. As a general rule, Microsoft doesn't recommend IMAP per se, imploring that you use its own Exchange ActiveSync protocol whenever possible. But, as many clients don't support EAS, the only option has been to use SMTP which must download each and every email in...
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Gmail users have had access to built-in Google Voice calling (in North America, at least) for years now. With Microsoft exerting a renewed push on the Outlook.com, it's no real surprise to see Skype making the transition this week. A few months back, Microsoft announced that a preview of Skype video calling + messaging was arriving in Outlook.com windows, and now, it's going global. Well, almost. Skype for Outlook.com is now fully available in several countries around the globe including the United Kingdom, Germany, Brazil, France, Canada, and the United States. For those who reside outside of that fence, Microsoft has promised its users that it's "working hard" to bring it elsewhere, and soon....
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For months, there've been questions regarding just how secure Skype's encryption was. After Microsoft bought the VOIP company it began moving to a more centralized node structure that made it easier to scale the product but at the cost of intrinsic security. Now, it seems such concerns were valid -- new leaked documents from The Guardian allege that the NSA has an effective backdoor to all of Microsoft's online products including Skype, Outlook, and SkyDrive. While The Guardian doesn't have any slides to show this time around, it suggests that Microsoft has gone beyond the minimal amount of grudging cooperation mandated by law. The company has reportedly helped the NSA "understand" certain alias...
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One way to boost your numbers is to migrate users of an older service over to a newer one. Such was the scenario with Outlook.com, Microsoft's new webmail service that was built to scale to over a billion active customers (with the occasional hiccup). Over the past six weeks, Microsoft has been busy porting Hotmail accounts over to Outlook.com, which required the relocation of 150 petabytes of data. That process is now complete, allowing Outlook.com to boast over 400 million active accounts. "Today, we're excited to announce that we've completed upgrading all Hotmail customers to Outlook.com. Coupled with the growing organic excitement for Outlook.com, this has pushed us to over 400 million active...
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