How to Enable or Disable Common PIN Patterns

Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 will reach end of support on April 11, 2017. To stay supported, you will need to upgrade. For more information, see Resources to help you upgrade your Office 2007 servers and clients.

 

Applies to: Exchange Server 2007, Exchange Server 2007 SP1, Exchange Server 2007 SP2, Exchange Server 2007 SP3

This topic explains how to use the Exchange Management Console and the Exchange Management Shell to enable or disable common Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 Unified Messaging PIN patterns for Outlook Voice Access users. You can enable or disable the common PIN patterns setting on a UM mailbox policy and it will apply to all UM-enabled users who are associated with the UM mailbox policy.

When Outlook Voice Access users dial in to a subscriber access number, they are prompted to enter their PIN so that the Unified Messaging system can authenticate them. After they are authenticated, they can access the voice mail, e-mail, calendaring, and personal contact information in their Exchange 2007 mailbox from any telephone.

There are several PIN-related settings that can be configured on a UM mailbox policy. The Allow Common Patterns setting is used to allow or prevent the use of common number patterns when users create a PIN. By default, this setting is disabled and prevents users from using the following number patterns:

  • Sequential numbers   These are PIN values that include only consecutive numbers. Examples of consecutive numbers for a PIN are 1234 and 65432.

  • Repeated numbers   These are PIN values that include only repeated numbers. Examples of repeated numbers are 11111 and 22222.

  • Suffix of mailbox extension   These are PIN values that include the suffix of a user's mailbox extension. For example, if a user's mailbox extension is 36697, the user's PIN cannot be 3669712.

Note

If the Allow Common Patterns setting is enabled, only the suffix of the mailbox extension will be rejected.

Before You Begin

To perform the following procedures, the account you use must be delegated the Exchange Organization Administrators role.

For more information about permissions, delegating roles, and the rights that are required to administer Exchange 2007, see Permission Considerations.

Also, before you perform these procedures, confirm the following:

  • A UM dial plan has been created.

  • A UM mailbox policy has been created.

Procedure

To use the Exchange Management Console to enable or disable common PIN patterns

  1. In the console tree of the Exchange Management Console, expand the Organization Configuration node, and then click the Unified Messaging node.

  2. On the UM Mailbox Policies tab, select the UM mailbox policy that you want to manage, and then click Properties in the action pane.

  3. On the UM mailbox policy Properties page, click the PIN Policies tab.

  4. On the PIN Policies tab, select the check box next to Allow common patterns in PIN to enable common PIN patterns.

  5. Click OK to save your changes.

To use the Exchange Management Shell to enable or disable common PIN patterns

  • Run the following command:

    Set-UMMailboxPolicy -Identity MyUMMailboxPolicy -AllowCommonPatterns $true
    

For more information about syntax and parameters, see Set-UMMailboxPolicy.

For More Information

For more information about Unified Messaging PINs, see the following topics: