Connection rules

Connection rules are used to allow or deny connections to an Exchange mailbox for specific device types. If your company uses Microsoft Exchange 2010/2016 or Office 365, you can use Modern Device Management to manage Exchange connection rules. The Microsoft Exchange 2007 server environment doesn't support connection rules.

By default, Modern Device Management does not manage connection rules, so if you have connection rules configured on the Exchange server already, they are not modified. However, if you configure connection rules through Modern Device Management, those rules override any rules configured on the Exchange server.

NOTE: Connection rules are applied to any device that connects to the Exchange 2010 server, regardless of whether it has an agent installed or not.

If you are unsure of what device models to add to the exceptions list, you can identify what models you have by trying to connect them to your Exchange mailbox. When you try accessing your Exchange mailbox from a device that is blocked, you receive an email with information about why the device was denied access. You can use the information from this email to add the blocked device model to an exception list, if you want to allow that device model access.

If mobile devices have already connected to your Exchange server and you want to continue to allow those devices, regardless of whether they meet the connection rule criteria or not, use the grandfather option.