🆕Microsoft Outlook protection: Block (with override) in Outlook

Find out how the override feature works in both web and desktop Outlook and how users can provide reasoning for sending an email that violate a block (with override) policy.

In this article, you will learn more about:

What will the user see when their email is blocked by a block (with override) policy in Outlook
What must the user do to send an email blocked by a block (with override) policy

Introduction

To use this feature, you must first activate Microsoft Outlook protection and deploy the Email protection for Safetica add-ins to users. Learn more about it here.

When you select the Block (with override) action in a data policy, certain users will be able to override applied restrictions and provide explanations for their actions.

Block (with override) is useful in companies where admins trust the users to only override blocking policies for legitimate reasons (for example, when a user needs to send a classified file to a customer, if sensitive content is incorrectly detected in an ordinary file, etc).

You can learn more about Block (with override) here. In this article, we describe what the end user will see and what they can do when their email is blocked by a block (with override) policy in Outlook.

What will the user see when their email is blocked by a block (with override) policy in Outlook

When an email violates a block (with override) policy, the Email protection for Safetica add-in prevents the user from sending the email, but gives them the option and instructions to override the blocking:

The user must click Provide a reason. Then they can choose to either:

Not send the email at all.
Override the blocking and re-send the email.

What must the user do to send an email blocked by a block (with override) policy

If an email is blocked by a block (with override) policy, the user must enter their reason for sending the email:

After clicking the Provide a reason button in the dialog window, a pane on the right will open.
Select a reason for overriding the policy from a drop-down menu (for example “I need a one-time exception”).
Provide a more detailed description for sending the email (optional).
Click Send again. Now, with the reason entered, the email should be sent without being blocked.

🍏 For macOS:

The pane on the right does not open automatically after the user clicks the Provide a reason button. To open the pane and add their reason, the user must click the Safetica logo in the ribbon.

Both the reason and the optional description are recorded for possible investigation by the admin in Safetica console.

The reason and description are auto-saved as the user writes. They can even close the pane or the email. The reason and description will be saved until the email is successfully sent.