Outlook Automation – Bypass Outlook’s Security Prompt

Once you finally get your Outlook automation up and running you will notice that your users receive a security prompt each time your database attempts to send an automated e-mail. Obviously, as a programmer this is not the ideal situation and there are a couple of options available to you.

What you need to know before going any further
The security prompt appears for a reason. MS added this prompt to try and stop malicious usage of peoples email without their knowledge and/or consent. Many virii were propagating themselves through peoples email. This type of added security will hinder this type of attack. As a developper you must weigh this carefully when considering implementing any of the following workarounds.

 

Outlook Redemption

This solution is often mentioned in numerous Forums. For more information refer to http://www.dimastr.com/redemption/home.htm

 

vbMAPI

Another alternative is vbMAPI which you can review at https://www.everythingaccess.com/vbmapi.asp.  I have no personal experience with this product, but it has been highly recommended to me by multiple very reliable source.

 

CDO

Another commonly refered to solution found in numerous Discussion Forums. The following website provides several example of programming with CDO.

http://www.devhut.net/2014/11/29/vba-cdo-mail/

 

Thrid Party Emailing Utilities

In my past life, when I was working for a multinational company, the work around that I implemented was to use BLAT to send the emails. I used VBA to produce a text file based on this information from within the database and it in turn was utilized by BLAT to send the email. It worked seemlessly! Best of all it is free.

 

VBScript?

Someone once mentioned that they could send emails using VBScripts without getting the security prompt. This said, I have never validated this yet.

 

Third Party Application to Automate the Confirmation

There are several little utilities available online that you can install on your clients computers that will simply automatically Click the Yes button to authorize that the email be sent. One of these programs is ClickYes. This however, bypasses security completely and could be considered a serious security issue.