Microsoft Business Solutions CRM Sales for Outlook (the Outlook client) requires that you have virtual private network (VPN) access to obtain Microsoft CRM information over an intranet.

Currently, you cannot access Microsoft CRM over an intranet without a VPN connection because Microsoft CRM requires Integrated Windows authentication.

If a client computer tries to connect to the Microsoft CRM server through a proxy server, the connection fails because Basic authentication is necessary to connect to the server through a proxy server and because Microsoft CRM does not support Basic authentication. For more information about this process, see "Configuring and Securing Web Access to Microsoft CRM," page 131, in the Microsoft Customer Relationship Management Implementation Guide.

Note Reports do not function if you use Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) encryption to expose Microsoft CRM on the Internet. Microsoft CRM supports using reports together with SSL encryption only when you use them over an intranet. For more information, see the Microsoft Customer Relationship Management Implementation Guide. To view reports externally, you must use a VPN connection.

The Microsoft Customer Relationship Management Implementation Guide is available on the Microsoft CRM documentation CD that is included with the Microsoft CRM installation CD.