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Insights · 25 March 2026

Intune and Defender basics for modern device management

A pragmatic guide to managing devices with Microsoft Intune and Microsoft Defender for Endpoint, with a starter policy set Australian SMEs can copy.

Most security thinking still leans toward the network: firewalls, VPNs, controlled offices. The world your business actually runs in is laptops working from kitchens, phones on home Wi-Fi and people travelling between sites. Modern device management focuses on the device itself, not the perimeter.

For Microsoft-centric SMEs, that means Microsoft Intune for management and Microsoft Defender for Endpoint for detection and response. This article walks through the controls we apply to most environments.

What Intune is for

Intune is the policy engine for your fleet.

  • Enrolment for Windows, macOS, iOS and Android.
  • Configuration profiles to enforce settings like disk encryption, OS updates and screen lock.
  • Compliance policies that decide whether a device is healthy.
  • App protection policies that draw a line around corporate data inside personal apps.
  • Endpoint security baselines pre-built by Microsoft, which are good starting points.

You then reference compliance state from Conditional Access in Microsoft Entra ID, so non-compliant devices cannot reach Microsoft 365 data. That single sentence is the modern endpoint story in one line.

A starter Intune policy set

This is roughly the baseline we apply for an Australian SME with a mix of Windows laptops and mobiles.

Windows

  • BitLocker on all internal drives, with recovery keys stored in Entra.
  • Microsoft Defender for Endpoint enabled, with cloud-delivered protection on.
  • Update rings: a Pilot ring at 1 to 5 percent of devices on the latest preview, Production at the rest on the General Availability channel, plus a Servers/Engineers ring with a delay buffer.
  • Local administrator: built-in account disabled, replaced by Windows LAPS for break-glass.
  • Endpoint Privilege Management for users who occasionally need elevated rights, scoped to specific apps.

macOS

  • FileVault on, recovery key escrowed.
  • Compliant macOS version pinned to current and current minus one.
  • Local admin denied for staff accounts unless explicitly approved.

iOS and Android

  • App protection policies: copy/paste restricted to managed apps, save-as restricted.
  • Compliance: minimum OS version, biometric or PIN required.
  • For BYOD, enrol the user identity, not the whole device. Wipe the corporate apps when someone leaves; do not wipe their phone.

Compliance feeding Conditional Access

A device is “compliant” if Intune says it meets your policy. The point of compliance is to chain it into Conditional Access:

  • Require compliant devices for Microsoft 365 apps.
  • Require compliant or hybrid-joined devices for admin portals.
  • Block sign-in from countries you do not operate in unless an exception is granted.

What Defender for Endpoint adds

Intune sets the rules. Defender watches what happens.

  • Endpoint detection and response (EDR), with a workable default tuning out of the box.
  • Vulnerability and configuration management, including patch hygiene and weak password discovery.
  • Attack surface reduction rules that block common malware patterns at the OS level.
  • Automated investigation and remediation, which closes routine alerts without analyst time.

For SMEs without a dedicated security team, Defender is the difference between hoping nothing is happening and actually knowing.

Keep operations boring

A few habits make the system easier to live with.

  • Tag devices by site, role and owner. Reports stop being a mystery.
  • Keep one environment, not separate “test” and “prod” tenants. Use ring-based rollouts inside the tenant instead.
  • Use Update Compliance and Defender for Endpoint reports to tell you when policy is drifting.
  • Keep a runbook in your wiki for: lost device, departing staff member, compromised account, policy rollback.

Common pitfalls

  • Enrolling devices but not requiring compliance in Conditional Access. The fence has no gate.
  • Setting strict compliance and forgetting break-glass accounts and exceptions, which then lock everyone out during an outage.
  • Treating BYOD the same as corporate. App protection policies exist for this exact reason.
  • Leaving local admin rights in place for convenience. Use Windows LAPS and Endpoint Privilege Management instead.

Closing thought

You do not need to deploy everything Intune can do; you need to deploy a sensible baseline and live with it for a few months. Once that is in place, Defender becomes useful instead of overwhelming, and Conditional Access becomes the joined-up control plane it is meant to be.

If you would like a hand getting started, book a consultation.