Today, Microsoft Teams is more than just a tool for productivity and collaboration in the modern workforce. Rapidly, it’s becoming a comprehensive solution for the future of hybrid work, bringing teams together around the world. However, before you can rely on Teams as your ultimate “work hub”, you’ll first need to ensure it’s secure enough to meet your business standards.
Microsoft Teams is built on the enterprise-grade cloud environments of Microsoft and Office 365. It also promises comprehensive control and management of all data shared within channels and conversations to the owner of the Microsoft Teams instance. Messages are not scanned or retained by Microsoft, and data-saving policies can be established by individual users.
But how deep does the security of Teams really go?
The Security Standards of Microsoft Teams
First and foremost, Microsoft Teams enforces organisation and team-wide two-factor authentication methods and single sign-on via Active Directory. You can also rest assured your data will always be encrypted both at rest and in transit within Teams.
Files shared within a Teams instance are stored in SharePoint, and backed by SharePoint encryption, while Notes in OneNote are backed by OneNote encryption. Wiki tab content is also backed by SharePoint security. To enhance internal security policies, Microsoft users can leverage a range of defensive features within Teams.
Microsoft Defender, for instance, is available for Microsoft Teams to determine if the content shared within channels is malicious in nature at a glance. If the content is deemed malicious, you can set policies for how it’s managed and removed from the ecosystem.
Defender also enables access to “safe links” within Teams, to help define which links users can reliably click on when shared by other users. The “Safe Attachments” feature works in a similar way, scanning attachments for malicious attachments. You can turn this feature on in your Teams admin portal, and define policies for dealing with dangerous attachments.
As a bonus, “Secure Store” within Microsoft 365’s security centre allows users to access a centralized dashboard for monitoring the security of apps, devices, and identities. Recommendations are available from Secure Score for Microsoft Teams administrators.
Conditional Access Policies and Compliance
Microsoft Teams aligns with other tools in the Microsoft ecosystem for core productivity scenarios, like calendars, meetings, and file sharing. Conditional access policies can be set for these cloud applications which also apply to Microsoft Teams. Teams is supported separately as a cloud app in Azure Active Directory, but without SharePoint, Exchange, and Skype policies in place, it may be possible for users to access resources they shouldn’t have permission to.
Microsoft Teams has a range of “compliance” features to assist with access management and employee usage too. The “compliance centre” is brimming with tools for communication compliance (such as flagging inappropriate messages), eDiscovery, and audit log searches.
Communication compliance offered by Microsoft’s Purview Communication centre allows companies to add users to policies which examine conversations for sensitive information and data related to regulatory standards, as well as offensive language.
