Office 365 cloud features do not work when using a privacy VPN

Hi

In the NordVPN application you must disable "Cyversec" and then, in the "Advanced Setting" change UDP protocol to TCP.

This worked for me.

Thank you Sudetta.   I just tried this and it seems to have worked also.   Office Apps seem to recognize that they are now connected with NordVPN running and connected in the background.     IN PARTICULAR, OneNote -- which wouldn't sync with the server and thought it was running locally only -- is not both recognizing it's connected, and is syncing.  Also, there was one website that I access regularly that I couldn't access that, after this change, I can access.

For EddieMN -- using PowerPoint now, online pictures load -- which they didn't for me either.

I don't use OneDrive so I can't comment on that.   It seems like that's a big problem so I wish I could comment.

Can't say for certain it's 100% fixed but I'd say that all appears normal.   I'll post again after I get some experience with these settings.  THANKS Sudetta.

Any other users -- we should confirm this for everyone so that the issue can be resolved when using VPNs/NordVPN.

It is all very confusing. I was not using CyberSec anyway, and also tried using TCP, but to no avail. NordVPN on my phone was fine, including working with documents from OneDrive!

Between posting my "me too..." response, and the suggestions that followed, I unsubscribed from NordVPN and started using TunnelBear, which at first seemed to work. But it didn't last.

Here is what is confusing me: some of my OneDrive documents open in desktop Word/Excel ok, but others do not and say I am disconnected! I created one document with nothing other than the word 'test' in it, and even that has the problem. I simply do not know what the trigger is.

My get-around is to either edit OneDrive documents in the online apps (i.e. within the browser) and not in the desktop apps. Either that or I simply save docs into Google Drive rather than OneDrive. Oh well.

I am sticking with TunnelBear only because they do not do refunds, but will look again at NordVPN next year at renewal time because it was more feature-rich. 

In both cases, btw, using the VPN on my phone cause no problems.

Bottom-line: not resolved, but I can work-around the problems on my desktop.

Office365 does not play well with VPNs and whilst this may be from a security perspective, it's also an issue using the service - I've only encountered issues with the Microsoft 365 product stack here - OneDrive, Outlook, and OneNote in particular with an inability to authenticate.

It's not a solution to disable a number of the features provide by a VPN simply to use a single product suite, although it IS a solution to switch to an alternative product suite... or even approach.

As this has been an issue for over a year, Microsoft should really sort it out and provide a functional mechanism whereby the end user's satisfied with some additional options one security that allow Microsoft to provide the service against these caveats.

Eiren O'Keeffe's recent response triggered me to respond further on this thread.

I had previously indicated that switching OFF CyberSec and switching to TCP in advanced settings solved my "problem" with the Office connection issues using NordVPN.   Well, come to find out that's only true for ONE of my computers, both on the same home network, same internet connections, etc.   So, making these changes DID fix the issue with NordVPN using a new HP Spectre laptop with a fully updated Windows 10 OS and updated NordVPN app.   However, using my old Lenovo T530 with fully updated Windows 7 and fully updated NordVPN app, AND using the same settings (no CyberSec and TCP instead of UDP) I still have connection issues, i.e., Office products to NOT connect with their server while using the VPN.

Anyway, hopefully someone from Microsoft will try to fix this -- you should be able to use any VPN and have it work with Microsoft products.

And that's not really a solution either, since one of the best reasons for using a product like NordVPN *is* the CyberSec functionality; web pages are night and day with their ad-tracking and identification services disabled... likely to be even more important given the assault on net neutrality!