Sensitivity labels
To protect sensitive data, such as personal details or confidential business information, the university uses so-called sensitivity labels in Microsoft 365. On this page, you can learn what sensitivity labels are and how to use them.
What is a sensitivity label?
A sensitivity label indicates how the data in a file or message should minimally be secured, and how you should deal with the data when saving, processing or sharing the file. Sensitivity labels are applied to files and emails that you save or share in Sharepoint, Teams, OneDrive and Outlook Online.
Which sensitivity labels are there?
The four types of label are ‘public’, ‘internal’, ‘confidential’ and ‘secret’. Labels need to be applied to documents which contain information with a specific sensitivity level or security level. The different levels are described in the table below.
| Public | Internal | Confidential | Secret |
| Information can be shared and is available without restrictions. | Information is available for all or defined groups of staff, students, researchers and guests of Leiden University and may freely be shared. | Information is available for a specified group of authorised staff of Leiden University and staff of authorised third parties that require access for the performance of their duties. | Information is only available for specific, named individuals (internal as well as external). |
Why is labelling applied?
Sensitivity labels help us to deal with information securely and responsibly. They help to prevent that sensitive data accidentally turn up in the wrong place or are shared with unauthorised persons. In addition, the labels give guidance in processing and protecting (sensitive) information. Labels help to protect sensitive information such as address details, banking information, passwords and IP addresses.
Applying a sensitivity label
If a label is automatically assigned to a file, then it is important to handle the document with care and, where necessary, to limit the ability to share or print it.
As soon as you save or share a document in OneDrive or Teams/SharePoint (or when it is saved automatically) and the file contains data that fits the sensitivity levels, then the label is applied automatically and on the basis of the recognition of number patterns or letter patterns. This is similar to how autocorrection takes place in a text. You will see the following text on the label: ‘our security system has detected sensitive information, please handle it with care'.
Not all sensitive information is automatically detected by the system. Therefore, it remains necessary to also manually label confidential documents when needed. Consider, for example, in case of a new contract, or minutes of a confidential meeting, or a report with sensitive company information that is not always recognised by the system. To add a sensitivity label in Word, Excel or PowerPoint, go via Start to ‘Sensitivity’ in the top ribbon. There, you can activate one of the four labels. In Outlook, you will find the ‘Sensitivity’ button on the right in the message window.