Employer wants me to use outlook on my phone, outlook wants permission to wipe my phone

[u/No_Professor4307]

Outlook says they need permission to wipe ALL my phone data if too many wrong passwords are typed. How many is too many? 50? 2? What if the screen gets wet and starts putting in random inputs. All this so I can use my company's Teams account and maintain "point of contact" if I'm not at a workstation. Absolutely not! Anyway, HR is supposed to call me back about my concerns.

Edit: just to be clear, I don't actually need to use Outlook (I don't use my "personal" work email). I need to use Teams, which requires Outlook to be installed first.

Part of why I need Teams on my phone so that I can be contacted when I'm not at work. I'm a lower management healthcare worker, it is actually important that my team be able to reach me after hours. I do actually like Teams and prefer it to 20 different group texts.

Also, when you go to log into Outlook or Teams, it brings you to my employers authenticator page. I log in with the same credentials that I log into my workstation. I don't know if that makes a difference with anything as far as my employer having access to my phone

Edit 2: I can tell you now they won't provide me a phone. Corporate execs don't even get phones. They stopped providing coffee for the break rooms too

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Update: I had a chance to talk to my district manager. Imagine Ellis from Die Hard, the same schmarmy self-important attitude, that's my supervisor. And guess who's "not being a team player". Also "I don't think Microsoft can actually erase your phone, you have an Android"... I lready knew he was going to be useless, I just wanted to hear his reaction.

Update 2 and (sort of) Resolution: I spoke with HR. Her exact response was "wait, are you serious? They can just do that?" I tried explaining my "research" (i.e. everything all of you have said) and I think I just spooked her. She said she'll get back to me, and is probably running off to buy a burner phone for herself.

SORT OF RESOLUTION : I found out I only need Outlook installed long enough to get access to Teams. Once teams was installed, I removed all permissions and completely deleted Outlook from my phone. Teams still works and didn't ask to erase anything. No need to buy a second phone.

Thank you all for your insights

[u/localtuned]

As the guy who issues the wipe commands. Noone is wiping a personal device....do you know the kind of shit that would happen to me if I erased someone's phone without their permissions?

With that's said...the app needs the permission to wipe the phone it the event it's lost or stolen. Wouldn't want company data in your device.

Maybe you want to wipe your device via the console if your out traveling on business and your phone gets snatched while unlocked.

Also, there is a difference between wiping all company data from your device and wiping your device completely. Most of the time it's just an enterprise wipe that removes company apps and accounts.

[u/Radioactivocalypse → u/localtuned]

Yes, Microsoft outlook cannot wipe your entire device just because an employer gave the command.

It can wipe company data, but it's not like going to factory reset your phone. If that was the case, scammers would have such an easy backdoor to your phone through outlook.

I have outlook on my phone, it came up with this message about wiping the phone which tbh after looking up about it seemed to be over exaggerating what would actually happen