I receive encrypted emails often enough that this has become an issue.
When I have encrypted emails in my inbox, using the arrow keys to navigate my inbox or even just opening outlook causes outlook to prompt me for my credentials to decrypt the email. It does this because outlook is trying to show me the email in the reading pane. This is extraordinarily inconvenient given my certs are on a smart card, so I must stop, insert my card, and complete the process, else outlook prompts me several times for my credentials, even if I try to cancel. Occasionally I even click away from the windows security smartcard window without noticing it, which freezes the reading pane entirely until my credentials are entered or I close the windows security smartcard window.
Without disabling the reading pane entirely, is there a way to stop outlook from prompting me for my credentials while I am simply scrolling past an encrypted email? I am happy to take extra steps to see an encrypted email, I just want the inconvenience of continual prompting to be gone.
1 Answer
What is the encryption type for the message you receive? Is it encrypted by Microsoft 365 Message Encryption？
If so, based on my test on my Outlook 365 client, when I select an encrypted message in the message list, it cannot be previewed, and the reading pane displays as the below figure. And i will only be prompted for credentials when I double-click the encrypted information.
Of course, there is another case where you will be prompted to enter your credentials as soon as you open outlook. If you have enabled always restore previous items after starting outlook and you do turn off outlook when you open encrypted messages, the next time you start outlook, the open encrypted messages will be restored and you need to enter your credentials. If this is your case, please make sure to close encrypted messages before closing outlook.
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