Office 365 : How to force users to change their password

Install Prerequisites

We will need MSOnline module to connect to Office 365 with PowerShell.

• Open a PowerShell prompt with administrator rights :

• Install MSOnline module :

PS C:\> Install-Module -Name MSOnline

Connect to Office 365

• Use Connect-MsolService to open the Microsoft Office 365 sign in window :

PS C:\> Connect-MsolService

• Sign in with an admin account :

• Enter password :

Reset user password

Force new password

• With this command we can set a password for a user :
  • -ForceChangePassword : Indicates whether the user must change the password the next time they sign in

PS C:\> Set-MsolUserPassword -UserPrincipalName user@shebangthedolphins.net -NewPassword NewPassw0rd -ForceChangePassword $False

Force user to change password at next logon

• After this command, the update password procedure will happen next time user will connect (it will be slower to apply with Outlook clients because it uses a cache mechanism) :
  • -ForceChangePassword : Indicates whether the user must change the password the next time they sign in
  • -ForceChangePasswordOnly : prevents the command Set-MsolUserPassword from generating a random password (source)

PS C:\> Set-MsolUserPassword -UserPrincipalName user@shebangthedolphins.net -ForceChangePasswordOnly $true -ForceChangePassword $true

Misc

• If you want to search for a user :

PS C:\> Get-MsolUser -SearchString cartman

• Extract every licenced users to a text file :

PS C:\> Get-MsolUser | Where-Object {$_.islicensed} | Select-Object UserPrincipalName | Sort-Object UserPrincipalName > c:\users.txt

PowerShell Script to force users to change their password

If we want to force a large number of users to change their password we can use a powershell script.

• First create a C:\users.txt file where you will put users names :

• Run this PowerShell script to force users to change their password :

###########################
# author : shebangthedolphins.net
# version : 1.0
# date : 2021.04
# role : force users from a text file to change their Office 365 password
# other : create a C:\users.txt file where you will put users
# updates :
#       - 1.0 (2021/03) : First Version
Connect-MsolService
$file = "C:\users.txt"

ForEach ($line in (Get-Content -Path $file)) {
    Write-Host "Set-MsolUserPassword -UserPrincipalName" $line.Replace(' ','') "-ForceChangePasswordOnly $true -ForceChangePassword $true"
    Set-MsolUserPassword -UserPrincipalName $line.Replace(' ','') -ForceChangePasswordOnly $true -ForceChangePassword $true
}