Critical information: Please review the requirements below carefully. Failure to follow these steps may result in incorrect data sync.
The most significant change in the Graph environment involves how calendar updates are broadcast to attendees.
Background
With EWS, Riva could update a calendar item from CRM to Exchange silently. However, the Microsoft Graph API automatically triggers meeting invitations/updates to all attendees whenever an update is made to an event that contains participants. Riva can no longer suppress these notifications.
New Default
To protect your users from sending unintended email notifications to all attendees (e.g., when a user updates the CRM body with sensitive notes), Riva has implemented the following default behavior:
Default Behavior: Riva will skip updates from your CRM to Exchange for any appointment that includes attendees.
The Result: Your calendar remains stable, but changes made directly in the CRM (like updating a description or category) will not reflect in the Exchange calendar if there are guests on the invite.
Options
You must choose the logic that best fits your business process:
| Option | Behavior | Best For... |
|---|---|---|
| Option A: Skip Updates (Default) |
Updates from CRM to Exchange are only skipped if the existing meeting in Exchange already contains attendees. Items created in CRM that sync to Exchange without attendees will continue to update normally. By default, Riva does not add attendees to the Exchange instance of an item that originated in the CRM, even if that item has attendees listed in the CRM. |
High-security firms or those with large external guest lists. |
| Option B: Invitation Mode | All CRM updates flow to Exchange regardless of attendee presence. Microsoft Graph will then automatically send update notifications to all participants. | Teams that use CRM as the Source of Truth for all meeting details. |
| Note: Enabling "Invitation Mode" is a global policy decision. Please consult your internal stakeholders before requesting this change via your account manager, as it impacts the communication experience for all your external clients. | ||
Important Context for Option A
A common concern is whether Option A prevents all CRM-to-Exchange updates. In a modern Riva configuration, most updates will continue to sync normally due to how Riva handles meeting participants:
Why Modern Configurations Are Mostly Unaffected
By default, Riva does not add attendees to the Exchange instance of an item that originated in the CRM, even if that item has attendees listed in the CRM.
We do this for two critical reasons:
Duplicate Prevention: To prevent the CRM from sending a separate invite that might conflict with the one already in the user's calendar.
Privacy & Control: To ensure that internal-only CRM records do not accidentally trigger external invitations via Exchange.
The Result
Because the Exchange instance of these items typically has no attendees, Option A’s "Skip" logic is never triggered. The update flows through seamlessly.
The only time an update is skipped is when a meeting in Exchange does have participants (e.g., a meeting you organized in Outlook or a shared invite) and you subsequently attempt to modify that specific record from within your CRM. In that specific case, Riva skips the update to ensure your clients do not receive a redundant or confusing notification from Microsoft Graph.
Best Practices
Advisory: Risks of Storing Sensitive Data in Calendar Descriptions
Storing sensitive client information or internal-only notes within the body or description of a calendar event in CRM is not a best practice and creates a significant risk of accidental data exposure.
The transition to Microsoft Graph has introduced a fundamental change in how updates are broadcast:
Automatic Notifications: The Microsoft Graph API automatically triggers a notification to all attendees whenever an event property—including the body or description—is modified.
The Exposure Risk: If internal notes are added to a Salesforce Event/Calendar description that maps to the Outlook body field, Microsoft 365 will broadcast those notes to every attendee on the invite the moment the record is saved.
Data Privacy: Because Riva cannot suppress these Graph-level notifications, sensitive or internal-only commentary intended for Salesforce may be inadvertently delivered to your external clients' inboxes.