Microsoft 365 App Compliance Program is now integrated into Partner Center!

Krishna Mawani

Our Microsoft 365 App Compliance program is now integrated into Partner Center and will be generally available starting November 16th, 2020. This integration will allow you to take advantage of the new automated process for completing Publisher Attestation and Microsoft 365 Certification directly through Partner Center. This blog post provides an overview of the app compliance program and what this new integration means for you.

The Microsoft 365 App Compliance Program consists of 3 tiers:

Image with 3 Tiers of our Program: Publisher Verification, Publisher Attestation and Microsoft 365 Certification

Publisher Verification helps admins and end users understand the authenticity of application developers integrating with the Microsoft identity platform. When an application is marked as publisher verified, it means that the publisher has verified their identity using a Microsoft Partner Network (MPN) account that has completed the verification process and has associated this MPN account with their application registration.

Publisher Attestation is where partners share general, data handling, security and compliance information pertaining to their app ecosystems. This reduces the need for IT Admins to work directly with app publishers. All the information needed to make an informed decision can be found for all apps that have completed the Publisher Attestation in one place and in a consistent format. The goal is to make it easier and speed up the process of app adoption while assuring customers that the apps they enable in their tenants meet their organizational standards.

Microsoft 365 Certification offers assurance and confidence to enterprise organizations that data and privacy are adequately secured and protected when using Microsoft Teams, Outlook, Office Add-ins, SharePoint Add-ins, OneNote and Project apps. Certification confirms that an app solution is compatible with Microsoft technologies, compliant with cloud app security best practices, and supported by Microsoft. During this process, app developers work with a third-party assessor to validate organizational security and compliance standards.

What does this integration mean for you?

Microsoft 365 App Compliance team partnered with the Commerce team to integrate the program into the Partner Center portal, enabling a unified experience for publishers.

This integration will allow you to take advantage of the new, smooth process of completing and updating your Publisher Attestation form directly in Partner Center. For existing partners, the original responses will be ported into the system, making it easier for you to update this information. After your Publisher Attestation is approved, Partner Center allows you to start the Certification process and also provides status updates, and error reports in case of rejection.

Apart from the obvious advantages of deprecating the manual process, this integration provides the following additional features and enhancements:

    • FAQ documents for Attestation and Certification
    • Hover overs in the Publisher Attestation form for extra information
    • User Guide for partners to navigate through Partner Center

And that’s not all. Our team is hard at work, partnering with Customer Service & Support (CSS) to provide helpdesk support for our partners. Have questions? Contact our helpline.

Overall, this is an exciting new milestone for our program. To get your Microsoft 365 Certification badge:

    1. Sign in to Partner Center.
    2. On the navigation menu, select Office Store, and then select Overview.
    3. Select the product that you want to certify.
    4. Select App Compliance and fill out the Publisher Attestation for your app or add-in and/or begin Microsoft 365 Certification.

Upon completion of the Microsoft 365 Certification, you may use the logo below at the express written consent of Microsoft . This logo can be used on websites, press releases, and other forums where it pertains specifically to the application which has completed the Microsoft 365 Certification process.

Microsoft 365 Certification Logo

Want to know about the benefits of our program? See the following resources to learn more:

What do you think? Share your feedback or carry the discussion over to our Twitter or Facebook.

Stay tuned for our next blog with more details about how our partners are taking advantage of the new integration!

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