Authored by Joe Deally
Head of Cloud Services
In today’s digital landscape, managing and securing data is more important than ever. IT and security teams are constantly looking for better ways to manage the entire data lifecycle and keep it secure. Microsoft Purview is a solution that addresses these challenges by identifying data, classifying it, and preventing data loss.
Microsoft aims to empower organisations including nonprofits by providing a robust end-to-end protection strategy to bolster their security framework. With Microsoft Purview, organisations can leverage the power of artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML), software-as-a-service (SaaS), and data loss prevention (DLP) to unify data identification, while centralising and managing policies across the organisation.
Key features of Microsoft Purview include:
Data Security:
- Data Loss Prevention: Helps discover and protect sensitive information.
- Information Barriers: Manages communication restrictions within your organisation.
- Information Protection: Safeguards data by applying encryption, rights management, and access controls.
- Insider Risk Management: Identifies and mitigates risks related to insider threats.
- Privileged Access Management: Controls access to critical data resources.
Data Governance:
- Data Catalog: Creates an up-to-date map of your entire data estate, including data classification and end-to-end lineage.
- Data Estate Insights: Identifies where sensitive data is stored in your estate.
- Data Map: Provides insights into how your data is stored and used.
- Data Policy: Enables seamless governance across on-premises, multi-cloud, and SaaS data services.
- Data Sharing: Facilitates secure data sharing of data within and outside your organisation
Risk and Compliance:
- Audit: Helps minimise compliance risks by tracking and auditing data activities.
- Communication Compliance: Monitors communication channels for policy violations.
- Compliance Manager: Assists in meeting regulatory requirements.
- Data Lifecycle Management: Manages data retention and deletion.
- eDiscovery: Helps organisations respond to legal and regulatory requests by identifying, collecting, and producing relevant data.
These features collectively empower organisations to gain visibility into their data, safeguard and manage sensitive data throughout its lifecycle, govern data in comprehensive ways, and manage critical data risks and regulatory requirements.
Getting started with Microsoft Purview is easy. The first step is to identify data by locating, categorising, and understanding its nature, location, and usage. This information is crucial for implementing effective policies. The next step is to classify the data to determine appropriate policies and mitigate risks related to data misuse. Finally, organisations can prevent data loss by using solutions that consider context and balance flexibility with blocking high-risk actions, while also educating users about potential risks and applicable policies.
In conclusion, a solution like Microsoft Purview can help organisations address the complexities of today’s decentralised, data-intensive workplace. By identifying, classifying, and preventing data loss, organisations can ensure the security and integrity of their data. This is particularly relevant for organisations preparing to roll out Copilot for Microsoft 365.
