Spam email address?

Question

Is [******@accountprotection.microsoft.com] a legit email address from Microsoft?

There is a link to recover a Microsoft account.

Answer 1

Dear Jean Stephens,

Thank you very much for posting your question on the Microsoft Q&A forum.

I completely understand how concerning it can be to receive an email related to your Microsoft account security. Based on the information currently available, it is insufficient to determine with certainty whether the email is legitimate. However, I am happy to provide some guidance that may help clarify the situation.

A legitimate Microsoft security notification may be sent from ******@accountprotection.microsoft.com. According to Microsoft, this address is used for official account and security notifications, such as verification codes or alerts about unusual sign-in activity.

Please first confirm whether you recently requested a password reset, sign-in verification, or account recovery. If so, the email may be expected. In addition, you should visit the official Microsoft Account website (https://myaccount.microsoft.com/), sign in and navigate to Security > Review activity > The related activity should appear there.

If you would like us to further verify the authenticity of the message, please feel free to share the full email header with me via private message. You may follow the instructions provided on how to view message headers in Outlook.

I hope the information above is helpful. If you have any further questions, please feel free to reach out.

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Answer 2

Yes. An email that comes from an address ending in @accountprotection.microsoft.com is a legitimate Microsoft domain used for Microsoft account notifications, including security codes and account recovery messages.

However, always verify before clicking links:

1. Confirm the sender’s address is exactly @accountprotection.microsoft.com (no extra words, symbols, or misspellings).
2. Check that the account being referenced is actually yours and that you recently initiated a recovery or security action.
3. If unsure, instead of clicking the link in the email, go directly to the Microsoft account site (for example by typing the address into the browser) and perform the recovery from there.

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References:

• Can I trust email from the Microsoft account team?
• Help protect your Outlook.com email account
• You receive a Microsoft account security alert email message in Office 365 Dedicated/ITAR (vNext)