Optimizing External Vendor Access Management in Microsoft Purview Without Tenant Addition

Question

In scenarios where a company collaborates with a large and dynamic list of external vendors requiring access to confidential files labeled in Microsoft Purview, the current practice involves adding each vendor as a guest user in the Microsoft Entra tenant. However, this process leads to numerous incidents requiring manual resolution, and some file owners opt to remove confidentiality labels to facilitate access, compromising data security.

Use Case:

Challenge: Managing access for a fluctuating list of external vendors without adding them manually to the tenant, avoiding incidents, and ensuring data security.

Current Practices: Removing confidentiality labels or manually adding external users to the tenant, both with security and efficiency implications.

Inquiries:

Automated Access Management: What automated solutions exist within Microsoft Purview or associated Microsoft services to manage external vendor access without adding them as guest users in the tenant?

1. Microsoft Entra External ID and B2B Collaboration: Can Microsoft Entra External ID's B2B collaboration features be utilized to grant external vendors access to structured and unstructured data within Purview? If so, how does this integration work, and does it require adding vendors as guest users in the tenant?
2. Simplifying Access Management: Given the complexity of managing a large number of external vendors, what best practices or tools within the Microsoft ecosystem can simplify this process without compromising security?In scenarios where a company collaborates with a large and dynamic list of external vendors requiring access to confidential files labeled in Microsoft Purview, the current practice involves adding each vendor as a guest user in the Microsoft Entra tenant. However, this process leads to numerous incidents requiring manual resolution, and some file owners opt to remove confidentiality labels to facilitate access, compromising data security. Use Case:
   • Challenge: Managing access for a fluctuating list of external vendors without adding them manually to the tenant, avoiding incidents, and ensuring data security.
   • Current Practices: Removing confidentiality labels or manually adding external users to the tenant, both with security and efficiency implications.
   Inquiries:
   1. Automated Access Management: What automated solutions exist within Microsoft Purview or associated Microsoft services to manage external vendor access without adding them as guest users in the tenant?
   2. Microsoft Entra External ID and B2B Collaboration: Can Microsoft Entra External ID's B2B collaboration features be utilized to grant external vendors access to structured and unstructured data within Purview? If so, how does this integration work, and does it require adding vendors as guest users in the tenant?
   3. Simplifying Access Management: Given the complexity of managing a large number of external vendors, what best practices or tools within the Microsoft ecosystem can simplify this process without compromising security?

Answer 1

Hi @Elena Victoria Del Caño García

Thank you for posting your query!

Managing access for a large and fluctuating list of external vendors while maintaining security in Microsoft Purview is indeed a challenge. However, Microsoft offers several tools and best practices to automate and simplify this process without compromising security or requiring manual guest user additions. Here are some ways that might help you handle the current scenario:

Automated Access Management Solutions

To manage external vendor access without manually adding them as guest users, you can leverage the following tools:

• Microsoft Entra Entitlement Management - This tool allows you to automate vendor access by enabling self-service access requests and predefined access packages. You can automatically approve, grant, and revoke access based on configurable policies, ensuring that vendors get the right level of access without manual intervention. This helps streamline the onboarding and offboarding process.
• Just-in-Time (JIT) Access with Privileged Identity Management (PIM) - If external vendors need temporary elevated access, JIT can automatically grant and revoke access when needed, which reduces the risk of over-permissioning. Access is only provided when required, and it expires automatically.
• Microsoft Purview Access Policies - Centralized governance can be set up to grant external vendors access to both structured and unstructured data within Purview. This can help ensure that the correct data is accessible to vendors based on their roles, without requiring manual updates to permissions for each vendor individually.

Microsoft Entra External ID & B2B Collaboration

You can indeed use Microsoft Entra External ID and its B2B collaboration features to grant external vendors access to structured and unstructured data in Purview. Here's how:

• Cross-Tenant Access - Microsoft Entra allows you to trust external vendors' identity providers (IdPs), so they don’t need to be added as guest users in your tenant. External vendors can authenticate with their own credentials (e.g., their Entra ID tenant or other identity providers like Google or Okta) and access the relevant data within Purview based on the permissions you configure.
• B2B Collaboration - When you configure Cross-Tenant Access settings, you can grant external vendors access to your data without manually adding them as guests. This eliminates the need for individual guest account creation, making the process more efficient and scalable.

Simplifying Access Management

Given the complexity of managing a large number of vendors, these best practices will help streamline the process:

• Sensitivity Labels & Microsoft Information Protection (MIP) - Sensitively labeled data can be protected without needing to manually adjust confidentiality settings. Using Sensitivity Labels ensures that only the authorized users (whether internal or external) have access to confidential data, regardless of where it’s stored or shared.
• Conditional Access Policies - You can enforce multi-factor authentication (MFA) and other access controls for external vendors accessing your data. This ensures that only secure, compliant devices can access sensitive information, providing an additional layer of security.
• Audit & Monitoring with Microsoft Purview - Monitor and audit access to your sensitive data. You can track who accessed which data, when, and under which conditions. This helps to ensure compliance and provides insights into vendor activity.
• Expiration Policies for Vendor Access - By automating access expiration, you can ensure that vendor access is granted only for the duration of the project and automatically revoked once no longer needed. This reduces the risk of prolonged access.

Final Thoughts

By using tools like Microsoft Entra External ID, Entitlement Management, Sensitivity Labels, and Purview Access Policies, you can automate and simplify the process of managing external vendor access without compromising security. The integration of cross-tenant access and B2B collaboration ensures that you avoid the need for manual guest user management.

I hope this information helps. Please do let us know if you have any further queries.

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