Medium severityauthentication
Power BI Error:
AADSTS50074, MFA Challenge Not Completed
What does this error mean?
The user attempted to sign in but did not satisfy the multi-factor authentication (MFA) challenge required by Conditional Access.
Common causes
- 1The user dismissed, cancelled, or let the MFA prompt time out (Authenticator push, SMS, or OTP) during sign-in to Power BI, Fabric, or another Entra-protected app.
- 2The user has no MFA method registered yet, or their registered method (phone, Authenticator app) is unreachable — so the strong-auth challenge cannot be completed.
- 3A Conditional Access policy requires MFA for this app, location, or risk level (e.g. sign-in from a new IP, non-compliant device, or outside a trusted network) and the interrupt was not satisfied.
- 4The user is signing in with an account type that cannot perform MFA in this flow — for example a service account or shared mailbox being used interactively instead of a service principal.
- 5The Authenticator app is out of sync, the device clock is skewed, or the session was interrupted (browser closed, network drop) before the challenge completed.
How to fix it
- 1Retry the sign-in and fully complete the MFA prompt — approve the Authenticator push or enter the OTP within the timeout window; do not close the browser tab during the challenge.
- 2If no MFA method is registered or the device is lost, have the user go to https://aka.ms/mfasetup (or https://mysignins.microsoft.com/security-info) to register or reset an authentication method.
- 3In the Entra admin center, open Sign-in logs, filter on the user and error code 50074, and inspect the Conditional Access tab to see exactly which policy required strong auth and why — adjust scope, trusted locations, or grant controls if the policy is over-broad.
- 4For non-interactive workloads (Power BI scheduled refresh, ADF linked services, Fabric pipelines), do not use a user account that is subject to interactive MFA — switch the data source / linked service to a service principal or managed identity, which is exempt from user MFA.
- 5If the issue persists for one user only, have them clear browser cookies for login.microsoftonline.com, sign out of all sessions in My Account, and re-register the Authenticator app to resync the time-based code.