News

Enrolled in Mult-Factor Auth… Now What?!?

Published:August 12th, 2020
Category:Collegewide

On August 12th all UF staff will be enrolled in UF’s multi-factor authentication system. A password will not be the only thing needed to login to UF systems. A second factor, like a DUO push notification, a phone call, or a security token will be needed for access.

More information about multi-factor authentication can be found on UF’s project site: https://it.ufl.edu/2fa/

Here are a few tips that we’ve found along the way that should help you out as well:

  • Make sure to register your office phone line. When you are having trouble with your cell phone (you either forgot it at home or ran it out of charge) it’s always good to have another easy option.
  • Register your home phone as well… for the exact same reason as above.
  • Register your cell phone as a “Call Me”, “Passcode” and “Duo Push” device. If the app has issues, you’ll still be able to authenticate via the “Call Me” method.
  • You can generate one-time use pass codes by logging in to https://account.it.ufl.edu/ (the button at the bottom).

The easiest, and recommended, method for your 2nd factor is using the Duo app to receive a push notification. When you login, you’ll get a notification on your phone that a login was attempted that you can approve or deny. However, there are instances where a cell phone isn’t easily accessible. In those instances you can generate the one-time use pass codes at https://account.it.ufl.edu/ to have on hand or get a passcode generator from the UF Helpdesk.

If you need more information about the passcode generator please contact your local IT.

TIP: The first time you try to use the UF VPN after enrolling in multi-factor authentication can be problematic because there initially is an extremely short timeout. Usually the authentication cancels itself before you even get the push notification from DUO. The way around this is to force the VPN to use a different factor for your first login that is a bit kinder on how much time you have (like having it call you). You do this when you enter your password the the syntax of ‘[your password],phone’ to make it call your first registered phone number. Controlling how the VPN works with multi-factor authentication is explained in https://www.it.eng.ufl.edu/kb/how-do-i-use-ufs-vpn/.

After your first login with multi-factor authentication, the timeout is adjusted so you have a lot more time to receive and answer the push notification.

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UF Is Migrating to GatorMail

Published:June 10th, 2020
Category:Collegewide

GatorMail Logo UF Faculty and Staff are joining students in the cloud version of Microsoft Exchange, which UFIT is branding as GatorMail.

WHEN will this be happening? 

UFIT will complete the migration of mailboxes for the entire University by October 15th. We have scheduled migration dates for the HWCOE on June 30th, July 28th, August 25th, and Sept 29th. All HWCOE mailboxes will be migrated on Sept 29th unless DDDs choose to migrate their faculty and staff on one of these earlier dates. Several departments have already decided to migrate earlier to avoid scheduling during the start of the Fall term. IT is continuing to work with DDDs to determine appropriate migration dates.

Your local Engineering IT Support will be communicating with you as your migration is scheduled. Additionally, as part of this migration, an email will be sent to mailboxes being migrated one week ahead of its migration date. An additional email reminder will be sent the day before a mailboxes migration date.

WHAT will NOT change?  

There will be no change to your e-mail addresses, and all of your mailboxes content (email, calendar items, tasks, rules/alerts etc.) will be automatically moved to the new email service.

WHAT WILL change? 

For the most part, Microsoft Outlook for Windows will simply need to be restarted after your mailbox is migrated. Once restarted, Outlook should automatically connect to your cloud mailbox and begin taking advantage of the new features of Exchange Online. So, for many users it won’t look like anything changed. However, people using other email clients (including Outlook on a Mac) and most mobile devices, will, unfortunately, have to manually reconnect to their mailbox.  Instructions for this will be included in the emails sent prior to your migration date.

There are a few other additional changes to mention:

  • when logging in, your username will be [GatorLink]@ufl.edu (i.e. albert@ufl.edu) (even in Outlook)
  • there are new procedures for people accustomed to managing distribution group membership through the Global Address List
  • the online web client address (previously https://mail.ufl.edu/owa ) will change to https://outlook.com/ufl.edu
  • sending an eFax by email will use [FAX#]@fax.local (e.g. 21234@fax.local) instead of the [] format
  • removing and adding your email account information will be necessary on email clients that don’t automatically recognize this change (particularly on mobile devices)

WHAT needs to be done before migrating? 

You do not need to make any changes yourself but please be aware of this change and pay attention to the information provided. Engineering IT Support may reach out to you to verify information about the resources you use. We will not ask you to verify your account or ask you for any login information but may ask about shared resources you use.

WHERE is there more information?

UFIT’s documentation for the GatorMail Migration project can be found at https://www.mail.ufl.edu/migration/ (link is now invalid) and https://info.mail.ufl.edu/office-365/office-365-migration/ (link is now invalid). These website include:

  • client migration experiences (what to expect for various email clients when a mailbox is migrated)
  • email client configuration / device setup instructions
  • known issues
  • FAQs

We will not be duplicating this information on www.it.eng.ufl.edu.

Your local IT support should be able answer any of your questions as well. HWCOE IT workers were migrated to GatorMail in early May in order to become familiar with the process and service.

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Changes to Microsoft Office Licensing

Published:May 12th, 2020
Category:Collegewide

We are preparing for changes to the way that UF and Microsoft activate Microsoft Office on Windows computers (changing from device based activation to device based subscription). MacOS computers are not impacted by this change and are already using user-based activation.

While this change occurs, it is possible that Microsoft Office on your work computer will deactivate. If this happens, Office makes it known quickly:

Microsoft Word will have a banner at the top of the document window showing that your ‘Product Deactivated’

Product deactivation causes Microsoft Office applications to limit available features. Outlook, for example, can no longer send email. To regain these features as fast as possible, we recommend user-based activation.

Here’s “How to enable user-based activation.”

As you may know, every UF employee is able to install and activate Microsoft Office on up-to 5 devices with user-based activation. User-based activation has come a long way since being introduced and now requires minimal effort to maintain. When trying to activate a sixth device, the oldest device will automatically deactivate to make room.

We will work hard to transition to device based subscription licensing for Microsoft Office using our endpoint management tools. This means we are trying to make this change automatically and transparent to you. Once Office is activated using this method, the device no longer consumes one of your user-based activations.

Zoom Updates & Changes

Published:May 4th, 2020
Category:Collegewide, Working Remotely

Zoom is updating yet again to improve the security of the platform. Changes to the way encryption is implemented will require version 5.0 or later of the desktop client. Zoom meetings will continue to be backward compatible to earlier versions of the Zoom desktop client until May 31st. After this date, you MUST be using a 5.X version of the Zoom desktop client.

Engineering IT is working to keep your Zoom desktop client up-to-date on your UF computers. In some cases UF computers that have been taken home may not be reachable by our endpoint management platform. As a result, please verify that you are using the latest version of the Zoom desktop client.

Since we cannot install updates on your personal computers please make sure to check your client version often and update as needed.

Additionally, UF will also be changing some default settings to improve security. As of now the only default setting scheduled to be changed is to require passwords for each new meeting created. This will go into effect on Tuesday, May 5th.

UFIT is monitoring changes to the Zoom desktop client and its settings. Other changes to improve UF’s security when using Zoom are being evaluated. If any are warranted they will be announced on the UFIT news channel at https://news.it.ufl.edu/.

Finally, UFIT is making one other change that may be of limited impact to the Herbert Wertheim College of Engineering. The Zoom UFL-PHI site account will be consolidating into the main UFL site on Tuesday, May 5, 2020 at 6pm. In order to resolve the numerous issues and challenges presented by the use of a separate Zoom site account, all Zoom UFLPHI users are being migrated to the UFL master account. Other items to know about this change:

  • On May 5th at 6PM all user accounts in the UFLPHI Zoom site are being automatically moved to a dedicated ‘UF PHI’ group inside the main UFL account
  • All scheduled meetings, webinars and their links will continue to work as normal
  • There is no impact or action required by users, except that users that are accustomed to entering ‘UFLPHI’ as the SSO domain need only enter ‘UFL’
  • The UFL sign-in option, https://uflphi.zoom.us will be deprecated.
  • The ‘UF PHI’ group provides the same level of protection as the UFLPHI site account (Note: while cloud recording has been temporarily enabled for UFLPHI, at no point should sessions containing PHI be recorded on the cloud)
  • Zoom Rooms need to be manually migrated from UFLPHI. IT contacts have been involved in this transition.

Some key benefits of this consolidation are the elimination of cumbersome user-account migrations, the ability to co-host and delegate meetings across the entire UF population, and a single Canvas integration to afford cross-disciplinary faculty access to all courses. After this change a new ufl.zoom.us landing page will be put in place that eliminates the UFL PHI site login.

Other Zoom Articles

Knowledgebase

So You Need to Change Your Password

Published:April 29th, 2020
Category:Collegewide, Working Remotely

Changing your GatorLink password while on campus can be a daunting task. Now think about changing it in this work-from-home world that we are currently experiencing. Under normal circumstances you simply needed to make sure to change your password on all systems or possibly face lockouts caused by old passwords remembered in wifi settings. Now compound that by the complexity of systems required to synchronize the new password when not directly on the campus network. This doesn’t always work nicely and sometimes you are left with having to enter your old password in some places and your new password in others. In some cases, this isn’t correctable without being directly plugged in to the campus network.

So, what process should you follow to make sure your password changes and synchronizes across devices so that you experience the least amount of problems as possible? Hopefully by following the steps below you’ll be able to change your password without problems and be aware of potential circumstances where you will have to continue to enter your old password.

Starting Your Password Change

First, close anything that uses your UF Gatorlink account for authentication. This includes the UF VPN, myUFL website, your UF mailbox (Outlook), Dropbox, Teams, Skype for Business, Zoom, etc. There’s a bunch. Don’t worry if you forget something (you are likely to), you’ll just have to close it to regain access.

Second, initiate the password change either from the UF login page (https://login.ufl.edu/) or the Gatorlink Account Management page (https://account.it.ufl.edu/). Do this by typing the address into your browser’s address bar (it’s a short and easy to remember URL and by doing this you insure you will get to the proper location rather than being redirected to a spoofed login page by a hidden URL in an email or webpage). Click the Change Password menu item on the top of the screen (UF login page) or the Change your password button (Gatorlink Account Management page). You will be required to authenticate with your current password at this point. After authentication, you’ll see the UF Acceptable Use Policy and, then, the Create a new password screen.

After you’ve finished this process your password has been changed. Any cloud services will synchronize your new password immediately. When you open Dropbox, Zoom, OneDrive, Teams, etc your saved password will no longer work and you will need to reauthenticate using the new password.

However, your computer login password is a different story and is where the fun begins. The process varies based on the computer you are using:

UF Windows Computer

If you are using a UF provided, Windows computer that uses your Gatorlink username/password to login, do the following:

  • Start the UF VPN (your new password will be used by the VPN client)
  • After the VPN is connected, lock your computer by pressing the Windows+L key (or by pressing Ctrl-Alt-Del and selecting “Lock” from the menu)
  • Wait between 30-60 seconds to allow synchronization
  • Unlock the computer by using your new password

If this works, congratulations! You are through the hard part. You should now reboot your computer to verify the change. When you login, you should be able to use your new password.

On the other hand, if the new password doesn’t work, use your old password to unlock the computer and try again (this time wait a little longer while the computer is locked).

If you’ve tried this and the new password does not synchronize to the computer while it is on the VPN and locked, contact your local IT support to assist you. In the meantime, you’ll need to continue to use your old password to login and unlock your computer.

UF macOS Computer

If you are using a UF provided macOS computer that uses your Gatorlink username/password, do the following:

  • Start the UF VPN (your new password will be used by the VPN client)
  • After the VPN is connected, lock your computer (press Ctrl+Cmd+Q or choose Lock Screen from the Apple menu)
  • Wait between 30-60 seconds to allow synchronization
  • Unlock the computer by using your new password

This will synchronize the new password to your mobile account. You may get a request to update your keychain (if this occurs, allow the update). Unfortunately, the password used to unlock the FileVault encrypted disk will not synchronize. Thus, your new login process after a restart of a macOS computer will be to unlock the disk using your old password and then login to the computer using the new password. Sound confusing? It isn’t after you’ve done it once or twice.

Your local IT will have to make changes to your computer in order to synchronize the disk unlock and login passwords. This will have to wait to be done when IT can physically work on your computer.

Personal Computer

If you are using a personal computer, or a computer that does not use your UF GatorLink account for logging in then you avoid the issues with synchronizing the login password.

Anything Else?

Are there other things to remember? There sure are!

You’ll need to review the wifi settings for laptops, tablets (iPads), and smartphones. Any device with a saved EDUROAM wifi profile will need to be updated. This may not be a big deal now since you aren’t routinely going to campus and accessing wifi. However, once you are allow back on campus the device will attempt to connect. When this happens your account will be locked due to the wifi profile using the old password. As a result, the best thing to do is review your wifi settings and have your device forget the EDUROAM and UF wifi networks. When you next use the UF Wifi system, connect to UFGETONLINE and begin the wifi onboarding process from scratch.

If you know you entered your new password properly and you still cannot login, maybe your account is locked. Despite our best efforts something sometimes gets missed. Maybe it isn’t something you missed but an application with a saved password not failing properly. At those times the process keeps retrying your old, saved password. After too many bad attempts, your account locks.

If you think this is happening, attempt to use any options to remove saved passwords or logout that the application may have. Close the application and wait.

Account lockouts are automatically cleared after 15 minutes. After you’ve waited, first login to the myUFL portal (https://my.ufl.edu) or Outlook Web Access (https://mail.ufl.edu/owa) to verify that your account is unlocked and you are entering the correct password. After you’ve verified you can login, attempt to open the other application again.

If you are continuously being locked out, contact your local IT for assistance.

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More Zoom Stuff

Published:April 21st, 2020
Category:Collegewide, Working Remotely

As with most things on the Internet, the popularity of a platform causes an arms race between the hackers and the developers. Zoom.us is no different with the recent releases of three new versions within the last two weeks and with Zoom.us changing the defaults to include more secure settings.

How do you keep up with it all?

First, you want to be sure to be keeping your Zoom desktop client up-to-date. Since it doesn’t require administrator permissions to install you should be able to run an update on the desktop client without issue. The Outlook plugin, however, does need to be updated by an administrator (and it has had its own set of updates too).

But how do you know what’s changed between versions and what setting’s are the new default? That’s where Zoom’s release notes are helpful. However, the settings can also be controlled by the UF administrator. In fact, UFIT has been busy reverting Zoom’s setting changes in order to preserve the current user experience.

Some of the most recent changes that you may have noticed to increase security have been:

  • Meeting IDs are no longer displayed in the Zoom meeting’s titlebar.
  • The Invite button has been moved into the Participants list (it no longer has its own button).
  • Meeting hosts now have a new Security icon that consolidates all the host settings into one place (which includes locking the meeting, changing screen sharing options, and enabling the waiting room (even if it wasn’t choosen when the meeting was scheduled)).

However, at the end of the Spring 2020 term, UFIT is going to change the default settings in order to increase meeting security. What’s being changed?

  • Meetings are getting passwords by default.
  • Screen sharing will be in Host Only mode by default.

UFIT is continuously evaluating Zoom’s changes and features and will announce any news of importance on the IT News Channel. They are also looking into enhancements to the service to make it more valuable to the UF community. For the summer they are looking at:

  • Adding an AI captioning service so that meetings can include live captioning.
  • Integration of Zoom into Canvas and Microsoft Teams/Office365.

Other Zoom Articles

Knowledgebase

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Updates to the Knowledgebase

Published:April 9th, 2020
Category:Collegewide, Working Remotely

We continue to update the knowledgebase on this site with new questions and revisions. These changes are not always announced via a post in the news section. Some of the changes to highlight include:

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Reminder: Keep Zoom Updated!

Published:April 2nd, 2020
Category:Collegewide, Working Remotely

It hasn’t been a good week for Zoom. On top of the reports of zoom-bombing, there have been announced vulnerabilities in both the Windows and macOS versions of the Zoom Desktop Client which expose passwords or allows hackers to run elevated commands to exploit your workstation:

An update was released today to address the Windows exploit, but it may take up to 24 hours for your client to notify you. It’s also always good to periodically check your version number to insure that you are still receiving updates. You can also force an update to your Zoom client since it doesn’t require administrative rights to be installed.

The current version of Zoom is 4.6.9 (19253.0401).

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New Zoom Security Feature

Published:April 2nd, 2020
Category:Collegewide, Working Remotely

Because of a publicly announced open meeting in Zoom, a UF student government meeting was zoom-bombed this week. UFIT quickly investigated and has provided a solution.

Zoom’s meeting options screen showing the new setting.

An additional feature that Zoom provides for restricting meeting participants to authenticated users has just gotten better. You can now choose to allow UFL Participants Only when creating a meeting invite. This change does not impact any defaults or current meeting settings. It simply enables the option, as displayed here, in your user profile.

You do have to shutdown your Zoom and Outlook clients and reopen them for these features to become available.

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Is your Zoom Meeting Safe?

Published:March 31st, 2020
Category:Collegewide, Working Remotely

With the increased self-quarantines, social distancing, and stay-at-home directives that is necessary during this time, UF, like most of the world, has moved online to get work done. The tool of choice at UF, and for many other places, for most online meetings has become Zoom. The utilization of Zoom.us has exploded due to the COVID-19 pandemic. As with any platform that sees such rapid expansion, the hackers and social misfits have found ways to make Zoom uncomfortable, to downright unusable, if the host hasn’t taken proper precautions to start a safe meeting.

A new term, zoombombing, has been coined to define the unwanted intrusion of an individual in a video conference call. Many times, especially if screen sharing is enabled for all participants, the intruder shows pornography or other disturbing images to all participants. Articles about this are popping up everywhere. The FBI has even placed warnings that hijackers are taking over school and business video conferences.

UFIT has created a Keep Zoom Secure website to provide best practices and setup guides for faculty, staff, and students using Zoom.us. The announcement of this new page has been included on the Keep Teaching page, https://ufl.zoom.us/, eLearning homepage and many other UF webpages… including a banner on Canvas itself:

"Security and best practices for Zoom" banner that shows on the Canvas website.
Banner from UF Canvas website.

The basic tips the Keep Zoom Secure page discusses include:

  • Generate a new meeting ID for each meeting (do not use personal rooms)
  • Set a password for the meeting
  • Disable join before host
  • Enable Waiting Rooms to monitor entrants
  • Prevent attendees from obscuring their identity (do not allow renaming)
  • Turn off file transfer options
  • Disable the virtual background
  • Disable private chat
  • Begin your sessions by limiting screen sharing to the host only
  • Lock your session after it has started to prevent new users from joining
  • Mute participants upon entry
  • Disable annotations
  • Don’t post your personal meeting ID on any public forums

The following information in our knowledgebase may also be helpful:

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