How to Send a Private File or Email Using Sensitivity Labels

Top Secret Files Stamp

With sensitivity labels, you can create document and email security protocols on a large scale, this is crucial for growing SME’s so you don’t have to worry about sending the wrong information or leaking sensitive information, nor waste time painstakingly sorting out each recipient for a specific document or email.  

Here I will show you how to create different levels of security, each with different protocols and allocate them to specific groups. This method is applicable across M365 apps, third party software, and services. In this blog I will explain this method in familiar M365 applications like Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Outlook. 

Get Started with Sensitivity Labels

Go to compliance.microsoft.com. 

Under Information protection, you will find all the options available to protect your files and emails: Overview, Labels, Label policies, and Auto-labelling.  

Labels and Label Policies

For this example, I will show you how to use Labels and Label policies. 

Creating a Label 

To create a label, go to Labels under Information protection.  

Create a label by clicking on the plus sign. 

Then name it, select a priority number, and scope being file, email, or file and email. 

Confirm to create your labels. 

Label Policies

Using labels that you create; I am going to show you how to create policies that you can apply to M365 applications. 

Creating a Policy

To create a label policy, go to Label policies under Information protection. 

To publish a new label, click on Publish label. 

In the Create policy window that appears select “Choose sensitivity label to publish” under Sensitivity labels to publish. 

In the sidebar that appears select a label from the list of the labels you have created or are available. 

In Admin units, choose which users and groups you want the policy to include. For this example, assign the default admin unit as “Full directory”.  

In Settings, choose additional privacy settings for users. 

For Document and Email settings, choose a default label for documents and emails. 

Name your policy, review, and submit your policy. 

After 24 hours to confirm updates, you can add your policies to your business applications. 

An Example of Adding a Label to a Word Document

From the Sensitivity tab in the toolbar above, choose from the following labels: 

Internal, Public, General, Confidential – External, Confidential – Internal, Confidential – Restricted. Pleases note that theses sensitivity labels have been created for our business, so it may differ from standard sensitivity labels. 

Sensitivity Labels

Confidential Restricted 

This document will be for the eyes and ears of individual recipients only, no further disclosure is allowed. Recipients cannot print, forward, or copy the information. 

Basically, the document will be sent, or somebody will get permission to view the document and it is fir that person only. Noone else can gain access to view copy, forward, or print that document. 

Confidential Internal

Disclosure of this information is limited, and sharing is restricted to users within the organization only. 

Basically, means that if tagged with this label the document will be used for internal use only, and no one outside of this organization will have the ability to gain access to this document. 

Confidential External

This is used when handling sensitive information intended for specific people inside or outside the organization. So, in this policy both internal people and specific external people will have access to the document. 

General

In this tag the information may be shared within the community including customers and partners, but not via public accessible channels. 

Public

This info can be shared with anyone in the world on publicly accessible channels and there is no limit or disclosure. 

Internal

Documents tagged with this label will be restricted to TECHTRON staff only and cannot be shared with any external users.  

So, to select the label simply click on the one you would like to use and confirm. Notice a pale-yellow banner appear on the top of the page confirming the tag you have selected. When you are happy with the document and tag, confirm and then send to your recipient. 

Thank you for reading our blog. We hope this has provided valuable insights in how you can leverage M365 sensitivity labels to enhance security and protect your organizational information. Always remember implementing sensitivity labels is the first step. Continually monitor and refine your security posture to ensure ongoing data protection and compliance. 

If you found this blog helpful, don’t forget to pop us an email or give us a call and subscribe to our social media channels for more informative content on M355 and other technology topics. 


Featured Image Credit

This Article has been Republished with Permission from The Technology Press.

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