Microsoft Copilot: What will it mean for Data Access Security and how can Torsion help? 

In the brief history of Microsoft adopting public generative AI: first came their investment in Chat GPT; then came AI-powered Bing search integrated into Microsoft Edge (using Chat GPT); now the launch of Microsoft 365 Copilot is imminent. 

What is Microsoft Copilot? 

At a glance, Copilot appears in Office apps as a useful AI chatbot on the sidebar. It’s a tool to help people with creating documents, reading and summarising emails, crafting presentations etc. It can be used throughout Microsoft’s full Office suite e.g. Microsoft Teams, Outlook, Powerpoint and Word. Some specific examples of how it can help, provided by Pocket-lint include: 

  • Copilot in Microsoft Outlook – Copilot will help summarise long email chains and help you respond to them too. You can also use it to quickly flag important messages or do simple things like get help with the tone of your messages and wording. 
  • Copilot in Microsoft Teams – in Teams Copilot can help you with interacting with colleagues and planning things. It can help with setting agendas, organising discussion points from meetings and formulating action points as well. It can even help with things like meeting summaries for those who missed the meeting. 
  • Copilot in Word – when writing Copilot can help create drafts of documents as well as help with rewriting sections, improving the tone of your writing and summarising text. 
  • Copilot in PowerPoint – here Copilot can be used to transfer your ideas into decks and can be used to add speaker notes to the presentations as well. 

 

The impact of Copilot on Data Access Security 

The answer is simple…it will catapult the already huge volume of data created by organisations even further into the stratosphere. There will be an additional tsunami of data and files being generated automatically by Copilot. The issue of controlling and securing data access within Microsoft 365 will simply get bigger. 

Whilst Copilot’s model is not trained on company data, co-pilot is able to interrogate all the sensitive data that a user can access ( which is often far more than they should have) in order to have meaningful conversations with a user. Which means, the content it generates will almost certainly contain sensitive company information, which could cause significant consequences if it is shared inappropriately. 

In a corporate world where it’s already impossible to manage Data Access and File Sharing manually, companies will need all of the help they can get to keep security, compliance and ‘who has access to what’ under control. 

How Torsion will help 

Torsion automates the control and governance of Data Access and File Sharing.  

IT teams help to install the software (which sits as an extra tab within the Microsoft 365 interface labelled ‘Sharing & security’) but then it runs autonomously – monitoring data access, revoking out of date or incorrect access, sending quick alerts to business users if something doesn’t look right and providing a complete 360 overview of ‘who has access to what, and why’. 

It stops the danger of file sharing becoming out of control and data sprawl. It applies sharing policies set by an organisation, frees up IT resources (no more manual permission checks!), and gives complete piece of mind to data owners, IT teams and compliance officers. 

How to stay in control of file sharing when Copilot kicks in  

If you’re going to be adopting Copilot in your organisation, talk to Torsion simultaneously. We will offset any security concerns that might occur from the additional data produced, leaving you to max out on the features and benefits of Copilot with complete confidence. 

Watch our short on demand demo here.