Update Outlook Safe Sender List via GPO

I had a client with the need to update the Outlook Safe Sender list in Outlook's Junk Email settings across about 100 end users. The list had only a couple of addresses and we did not want to overwrite whatever list was already in place for each end user. They have an Active Directory environment and have a couple of sites. They also use Outlook 2007 and 2010. So the question became, how can this be done through Group Policy? Do we have to run an MSP package or can we just use Administrative templates to set the information?

I found the Office 2007 and Office 2010 Administrative GPOs on Microsoft's site. I downloaded them and placed them in the correct location. These GPOs are for Windows 2003 or Windows 2008 Active Directory environments. Don't forget to copy the ADML files in, too. You will get errors when attempting to modify a GPO with the Office ADMX Administrative templates.

I made the appropraite changes in the Outlook GPO. The Junk Mail filter is located under User Configuration > Administrative Templates > Microsoft Office Outlook (version here) > Tools | Options > Preferences > Junk E-mail. I enabled the list setting and pointed to the location of the list and allowed the list to be updated, instead of overwritten, among a few other options. I attempted to have the GPO push to my test computers and only a couple of the settings took effect. The list did not take effect. I researched the issue and found this is a common problem.

I found this Technet thread -

http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/sr-Latn-CS/outlook/thread/0ddcf321-9158-4078-ac83-45b33ef98266 - and discovered my problem. The registry keys were not getting created through the GPO and therefore, no list was being applied. I created the keys using the Group Policy Preferences for the user and successfully pushed the list to the test computers.

 

The following registry keys are required for Outlook Safe Sender lists to be populated inside:

 

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Policies\Microsoft\office\14.0\outlook\options\mail

"JunkMailImportAppend" DWORD = 1 NOTE: This is DWORD value. “1” is for Appending. “0” is for Overwrite.
"JunkMailSafeSendersFile" SZ = "C:\SafeSenders.txt" NOTE: String value is set to filepath of txt file
“JunkMailImportLists" DWORD = 1 NOTE: 1 = Enabled 0 = Disabled

 

Upon import of the list the JunkMailImportLists value will automatically change to 0. If this registry entry is set to 1 from Group Policy it will continue to import the list at each logon. Rest assured, it will not create duplicate addresses for each subsequent logon. If you are using Outlook 2007, simply replace the 14.0 with 12.0 in the registry path. The same values work for Office 2007

 

I used the option to append to the current list so that if anyone has a specific sender in their list, my imports won't affect their individual settings. This is important to note, as some end users can create a rather long list of acceptable safe senders, especially if they subscribe to mailing lists. Many times these can get caught in Outlook's Junk Mail. Overwriting that list may cause more headaches. The best to avoid that pitfall is understanding the needs of the end users affected by the anticipated changes.

 

The other option available mentioned in the thread is to update the Exchange Server with a few cmdlets. My customer uses a hosted Exchange environment, so this was not an option for us. Implementing the registry settings was simple enough and can be maintained easily.

 

Credit goes to Jahawk at Microsoft for showing this information in the Technet thread.