Microsoft released version 1.1.557.0 yesterday, hot on the heels of last week’s important 1.1.553.0 release that for the first time fixed a critical security issue in Azure AD Connect.

With new features for Azure Government cloud and Azure Germany available in this release, and PTA not automatically enabling PHS, this release is particularly appealing to highly-regulated and highly-secure organizations.

Fortunately, too, this release does not require a Full Synchronization. With current Full Sync cycles as long as 42 hours, this is good news for releases that follow up each other at this pace.

Note:
At this point, this version is not available through Azure AD Connect’s Automatic Upgrades feature.

What’s New

Azure AD Connect

Password Write-back is now available for preview with Microsoft Azure Government cloud and Microsoft Cloud Germany.

The Initialize-ADSyncDomainJoinedComputerSync PowerShell Cmdlet now has a new optional parameter named –AzureADDomain. This parameter lets you specify which verified DNS domain name to be used for configuring the service connection point (SCP) in Active Directory Domain Services.

Pass-through Authentication (PTA)

The name of the agent required for Pass-through Authentication (PTA) has been changed from Microsoft Azure AD Application Proxy Connector to Microsoft Azure AD Connect Authentication Agent.

Enabling Pass-through Authentication (PTA) no longer enables Password Hash Synchronization (PHS), by default.

Fixed issues

Azure AD Connect

The team fixed an issue with the Initialize-ADSyncDomainJoinedComputerSync PowerShell Cmdlet that caused the verified domain configured on the existing service connection point (SCP) object to be changed even if it is still a valid domain. This issue occurs when your Azure AD tenant has more than one verified domain, that can be used for configuring the service connection point (SCP) in Active Directory Domain Services.

Version information

This is version 1.1.557.0 of Azure AD Connect.
It was signed off on on July 4, 2017.

Download information

You can download Azure AD Connect here.
The download weighs 79,6 MB.

Concluding

Azure AD Connect version 1.1.557.0 is currently not offered to organizations currently utilizing Azure AD Connect, but it is the only version available for download, now.