When dealing with sensitive information within Microsoft 365 you often need to utilize a sensitive info type.  This is an entity within the security console that groups data by the sensitive information it contains.  For example, a credit card is a sensitive info type and is configured to look within content for credit card number formats.  Luckily, Microsoft provides 100 pre-configured sensitivity types and they really cover a large number of possibilities.  Well, what if you have a type of sensitive data that isn’t in the provided templates.  Well, that’s where this blog post comes in handy.  In this post, I will show you how to create a sensitive info type in Microsoft 365’s security console.

Create a Sensitive Info Type

Follow these steps to create the sensitive info type within your tenant:

  1. Log in to the Microsoft 365 security console (https://security.microsoft.com/)
  2. Click on Classification -> Sensitive info types -> “+ Create info type”

Create a Sensitive Info Type - Create New Sensitive Info Type

 

  1. Provide the info type with a meaningful name and description.
  2. Click Next

Create a Sensitive Info Type - New Sensitive Info Type Name Description

 

  1. Next, you need to add at least one element it needs to look for that makes the content sensitive to your organization.  Click on “+ Add an element”

Create a Sensitive Info Type - New Sensitive Info Type Add an Element

  1. Select the content to detect.  Can select from keywords, a regular expression, or a dictionary (large list of keywords).  In our case, we are looking for keywords.

Create a Sensitive Info Type - New Sensitive Info Type Select Content Type

  1. Type in the word or phrase that defines the sensitive info (ex. “Super Sensitive Content”).
  2. If there is more than one set of content to search for can add it in the supporting elements, but this is optional.
  3. The confidence level can be modified if required.
  4. The Character proximity option allows you to set how close the primary content and any supporting content needs to be in order to be considered part of the info type.
  5. Click Next

Create a Sensitive Info Type - New Sensitive Info Type Add Content to Search For

  1. Review settings and click Finish.

You will be prompted an inquiry determining if you want to test the sensitive info type first.  It is recommended you do this.

It will take some time for the sensitive info type to show up in any policy or label creation wizards, but it will show up in the sensitive info type list immediately.

 

Thanks for reading!