Self-Service Password Reset - SSPR

 

Self-Service Password Reset (SSPR) is the process of resetting the password on your University of Guelph account when you have forgotten it, using existing MFA methods that you have previously setup. You will need access to two of your MFA methods to perform the reset.

NOTE: External email addresses and Security questions can be used to complete Self Service Password Reset, even though they are not available as an MFA method when logging in.

1. Navigating to Self-Service Password Reset

To navigate to the Self-Service Password Reset page from the U of G login screen, there are two primary methods:
 

  1. If you want to proceed immediately to the Self-Service Password Reset page before entering a password into the login screen, you can select the “Forgot your password?” option, below the “Password” textbox:

     
  2. If you’ve entered your password, and it was identified as incorrect, you may select the “reset it now” option, above the “Password” textbox:

 

2. Performing Self-Service Password Reset

To start the Self-Service Password Reset process, you’ll first need to enter the alphanumeric characters displayed in the picture shown on your screen, into the empty textbox below those characters (these characters are case-sensitive) or enter the words in the audio played when you select the speaker icon and select the blue “Next” button:

 

 

Next, you’ll need to complete two verification steps involving authentication methods on your account.

NOTE: Two verification steps must be completed to finish the Self Service Password Reset. The verification steps presented to you will depend on the authentication methods you have set up on your account (eg. Microsoft Authenticator, Phone, Hardware Token, Email, Security Questions etc.). 

For this example, the account has the Microsoft Authenticator and Phone MFA methods setup on the account. 

For this method you’ll need to enter your mobile phone number into the corresponding text box, and then select the “Text” button:

 

 

You may then enter the verification code contained in the text message sent to your mobile phone into the corresponding text box, and select the “Next” button:

 

 

NOTE: Depending on the Authentication methods you've added to your account previously, (eg. Microsoft Authenticator, Phone, Hardware Token, Email, Security Questions etc.), you will be provided more options than what is presented below. The following screenshots are examples of what you may see.

The second method we’ll demonstrate is the “Approve a notification on my authenticator app” option. To start, you may press the “Send Notification” button:

 

 

Once you receive and click on the notification on your phone, you will be prompted to enter the number shown on your computer screen into the textbox in the notification pop-up on your phone:

 

 

Other methods of completing the verification steps include answering Security Questions (assuming you've already set up the Security Questions on your account), where you will be prompted to answer three of them from a list of five. Once you've entered the questions correctly, you may press the "Next" button:

 

3. Resetting Password

Once you successfully complete two verification steps, you will be prompted to enter the new password for your account. The password requirements are as follows:

 

Parameter

 Requirements
Characters allowed

A-Z

a-z

0-9

@ # $ % ^ & * - _ ! + = [ ] { } | : ' , . ? / ` ~ " ( ) ; < >

Blank space
Characters not allowed Unicode characters
Password restrictions A minimum of 10 characters and a maximum of 256 characters.
Requires all four of the following types of characters:
- Lowercase characters
- Uppercase characters
- Numbers (0-9)
- Symbols (see the previous password restrictions)
Password change history The last password can't be used again when the user changes a password.

 

Once you’ve entered your new password and re-entered it in the “Confirm new password” textbox, you may select the “Finish” button to finalize the password reset:

 

After resetting your password, you will be provided a “click here” link, to allow you to proceed with logging into your account with your new password:

 

 

4. Adding additional Self-Service Password Reset methods

If you want to add additional methods to allow you to complete the Self-Service Password Reset process, in the case that you lose access to your current methods, you can follow the steps provided on the following IT Help page: https://ithelp.uoguelph.ca/mfa-add-remove

 

 

 

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