Welcome to part 2 of this Microsoft Purview blog post series. If you missed part 1, please do check it out at the following link, Introduction to Microsoft Purview – Part 1 – Cloud Build. In this post, we will explore the Microsoft Purview portal, exploring its features and functionalities. By the end of this article, you will have an understanding of how to navigate the Microsoft Purview portal.
Now that you have a basic understanding of what Microsoft Purview offers, let’s familiarise ourselves with the Microsoft Purview portal.
If you have recently accessed the compliance portal, you may be aware that the legacy portal has been deprecated and is gradually being retired. Accessing the legacy portal at compliance.microsoft.com will remind you that the old portal has been retired, and you’ll be redirected to the new portal, as shown in the image below.
The new Microsoft Purview portal
The new Purview portal offers a single pane of glass view as it brings together data governance, data security, and compliance solutions to help you quickly discover and protect data stored across platforms and apps including Microsoft 365, Microsoft Azure, Amazon Web Services, and more.
The new portal is designed to make securing and governing your data easy and efficient. It has a refreshed design that provides a consistent look and feel and simplified navigation into Microsoft Purview solutions.
The Microsoft Purview portal provides access to data governance, data security, and risk and compliance solutions all from the one place. I briefly covered these three pillars in the first part of this blog series, so please do check it out.
Throughout this series, I’ll be accessing the new Microsoft Purview portal via purview.microsoft.com
Let’s get started and familiarise ourselves with the new portal before we dive into the various Microsoft Purview offerings in further posts.
- Access and login to purview.microsoft.com
- A Welcome to the new Microsoft Purview portal window appears. The new Microsoft Purview portal will gradually become the default portal over time.
3. I commence by clicking the check box, I agree to the terms of data flow disclosure and privacy statements, and then click get started.
4. I am redirected to the new Microsoft Purview portal
5. Towards the top, there is an automated rotating slider which includes different messages. The first message informs me that Purview supports platforms such as Microsoft 365, Microsoft Azure, Microsoft Fabric and more.
6. As I scroll down the page, I see a few of the popular solutions listed including Data Catalog, Information Protection, Data Loss Prevention, Insider Risk Management and I can click view all solutions to view more. I’ll cover some of these solutions in further posts in this blog series.
7. Below solutions, I see featured insights. The stats below show Microsoft 365 as a top platform. These insights also show which platforms store the most data, in my case I only have Microsoft 365 in my demo environment. This currently includes data in Microsoft 365 such as unstructured data like documents, emails, and other content.
8. Towards the right in the image above, I see Top 3 sensitive info types by platform. This is based on sensitive information detected in my demo content. Microsoft Purview has automatically located this data in my Microsoft 365 platform and listed it in the portal. I’ll cover sensitive info types in a later blog post as part of this series.
9. As I scroll down, I get to compliance posture status. It’s empty at the moment as I have only started to use Microsoft Purview in this demo environment. This score measures your progress in completing recommended improvement actions. Your score can help you understand your current compliance posture and it can also help you prioritise actions based on their potential to reduce risk.
10. Further down we have the trials and recommendations area from where you can view the different products and give them a trial to improve your experience. Click view all trials and recommendations to access more.
11. Finally, towards the bottom of the page we have Knowledge Center where you can learn more about Purview via free videos and Microsoft Learn content. Click the link Go to Knowledge Center to view more useful content.
12. Let’s continue to explore the portal for now. We’ll revisit the configuration options and features in later posts.
13. I’ll start with clicking settings located in the left pane.
14. The account overview page shows a free version of Microsoft Purview as shown in the image below. The free version is an automatically available instance, ready for your users without needing to set it up. It allows your organisation to try Microsoft Purview’s basic capabilities and begin your governance journey.
I already have access to Microsoft 365 E5 licenses so I should be able to continue with this blog series but let’s see how we get on as we make progress. Microsoft 365 E5 is an enterprise level cloud based license that combines best in class productivity apps with advanced security, compliance, and analytical capabilities. For more information on what features are included in Microsoft 365 E5, visit the following Microsoft Learn link, Microsoft 365 E5 | Advanced Security 365 | Microsoft.
15. Clicking the upgrade account button allows me to upgrade to the enterprise version. I won’t be upgrading just yet.
16. You’ll also see the option to upgrade to the enterprise version via an icon on the overview page as shown in the image below.
But what’s Microsoft Purview enterprise compared to the free version. Below is a comparison. I would recommend you access the following link for an updated version of the comparison table.
What’s in the free version of Microsoft Purview governance solutions?
17. Back to the Purview portal, I see several options in the left pane including roles and scopes, data connectors and more. I’ll cover roles and scopes in the next post.
18. Under solution settings, a list of the different Purview solutions are visible.
19. To view all available solutions go back to the home page and click Solutions from the left pane.
I will cover most of the above solutions in later posts.
For now, please explore to get yourself familiar with the Microsoft Purview portal.
When you’re ready, let’s move to part 3. Click the following link, Part 3 roles and permissions.
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