What’s changed and why
The way in which we control or manage access to our systems and network, called Access Controls, have recently been realigned to reflect industry standards.
This has been done to reduce the cyber security risks of compromised accounts, and help protect the University, our data, and that of our partners.
Find out more: Factors that impact how often you need to sign in with MFA
How you may be affected
Depending on the automatic risk score generated for your sign-in, you may experience more frequent requests to re-authenticate through passwords and MFA.
For example, if you have a:
- high risk score, you will be asked to frequently authenticate your identity (with password and MFA) several times a day.
- medium risk score, you will be asked to authenticate (with password and MFA) once per day
- low risk score, you shouldn’t experience any changes to your log in experience
In addition, the ability for external collaborators to access our systems and applications (such as Microsoft Teams) may be affected depending on the ‘at risk’ status attributed to their account by their home university or company.
What you need to do
If you are a University of Bath user associated with high risk, the rating will be automatically reset to ‘Low’ through a simple password reset. Follow the guidance to change or reset your password.
If you collaborate with external users who are no longer able to access shared areas or files, please share the information below, which they will need to progress with their home IT department:
- The University of Bath’s Access Controls do not allow them to access our systems or applications as they have been flagged as "at risk" by their home university or company. They will need to contact their respective IT teams to resolve this and have the flag removed. Guidance for their home IT department about remediating and unblocking affected users:
Further help or guidance
Please request IT help via TOPdesk if you need further support.