Moving MFA to a new phone

Upgrading your mobile phone should be a good experience, but if you don’t prepare in advance to move your Microsoft Authenticator and multi-factor authentication (MFA) accounts, it can turn into a frustrating experience. Follow these steps while you still have access to your old phone.

Instructions

Step 1: Change your default MFA authentication method to Phone - text.

1. Sign in to https://myaccount.microsoft.com with your PCCC account credentials. This is the step that requires your old phone and Microsoft Authenticator app.

2. Click on Security info in the left hand navigation, then select the “Change” link for the default sign-in method.

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3. Change the default method from Authenticator app to Phone - text.
   
   

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4. Delete the Microsoft Authenticator method. This is required before you can add it again on your new phone.
   
   

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5. You should now be able to sign in using MFA via text messages to your phone number.

Step 2: Prepare your new phone

If you are starting with a fresh phone with no applications or data restored from your old phone, you can follow the instructions these linked instructions to install the Microsoft Authenticator app from your app and reconfigure your MFA methods.

If you have restored apps and data to your new phone from a cloud backup. You should already have Microsoft Authenticator app installed. In this case:

1. Open Microsoft Authenticator

2. Click Restore from backup

You should see all your old MFA accounts listed. The PCCC accounts should have a red “Action required” alert similar to the one in the image below.

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Step 3: Add or re-verify the PCCC account in Microsoft Authenticator

Follow the instructions from Step 2 onwards to add the PCCC MFA account to Microsoft Authenticator.

Congratulations! You are all set up.