Microsoft Exchange Online Creates New Outlook Contacts Impacting InterAction

We were alerted that there is an issue with Microsoft Exchange Online. Behind the scenes, Microsoft has recently been merging contact lists for users who have used Skype for Business before or are currently using Microsoft Teams with their Exchange Online contacts to create a Unified Contact Store. They have now encountered an issue which is causing old data from Skype/Teams to mix into Outlook contacts. As a result, some contacts might display information in the wrong field, such as middle initials in their first name field, or their first and last names could be blank in Outlook. If your InterAction instance has an Outlook Sync enabled, this change in contact field may propagate into your InterAction database.

We have alerted Microsoft about this and are helping them resolve their issue as soon as possible.

We recommend at this time for InterAction users to:

• Temporarily disable Outlook Sync until Microsoft has completed their migration and taken any remedial action to correct their errors in Contacts.
• Limit the propagation of data issue by closely reviewing your Data Change Management tickets.
  • Review your DCM rule configuration to require review before changes are pushed out to firm contacts.
• Ensure a fallback position by retaining backups from December 18, 2023 (or earlier), which is when Microsoft started the data merge.

We are monitoring this closely. Please reach out to our support team at support@interaction.com or your client advisor with any questions. We will post updates as they are available. 

Note: The information on this page will be modified as we learn and understand more about this issue. The timeline below will be used to track when updates are made to this article.



Update History

• JAN 12, 2024 03:15ET: Update
• JAN 05, 2024 08:45ET: Original Post