How to use the External Sharing feature in Office 365

In most businesses, being able to share content with external users is a very important part. This capability is even of greater importance when working with a third party, customer, or supplier with whom users need to collaborate outside of the business.

For that reason, in this article, TipsMake will discuss with you what External Sharing feature is, the different levels of external users, and then guide you on how to share content externally. Office 365.

What is External Sharing?

From the outside, External Sharing in Office 365 is the ability to deliver documents or content to users working outside the enterprise.

From the inside, External Sharing can mean completely different, depending on whether the content is shared anonymously with external users or with authenticated external users.

Who are anonymous users?

A document or folder can be shared with external users via an anonymous link, which means that the person accessing the document cannot be identified. These guest users are referred to as 'anonymous users'.

If you choose this option, your document will be visible to anyone with access to the link, and they can also forward it to other external users. It is important to note that documents containing sensitive or personally identifiable information should never be shared in this manner.

The person submitting the document can make a decision to allow 'view-only' or 'editable' access with an expiration date can be set. Essentially, permissions are granted to a hyperlink, not to the user.

Who are an authenticated external user?

Another way to share content is with authenticated external users, meaning you invite users via email that they need to sign in with an authenticated account before they can access the content.

As soon as they accept the invitation, they are automatically added to the organization's folder, as external users, but will only be able to access the elements you've shared with them. Again, it's important to make sure that you don't grant them access to the entire website, if it contains sensitive or personally identifiable information.

To be able to see if the user accepts the invitation, you can do this by viewing the pending invitation from within the settings, then going to the 'Access requests and invitations' tab or you have You can manually search for guest usernames in the organization's directory.

How to share documents with external users in Office 365

After asking your IT team to configure external sharing for SharePoint or OneDrive, you're ready to share your documents with external users.

Share documents or SharePoint or OneDrive folders with anonymous users

Step 1: From within SharePoint or OneDrive, go to 'SharePoint document library' or 'OneDrive for Business (your)' where the document or folder you want to share. Next, select it by ticking the circle to the left of the document or folder.

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Step 2: Select Share and Anyone in the link settings. This determines whether the guest user can edit the document, then make sure that you have set an expiration date for the hyperlink.

Step 3: Then, select Apply. You will be given a link that you can copy or email to selected external users, which will not require them to sign in to access.

Share documents with authenticated external users

Step 1: The process of sharing documents or folders with authenticated users is as easy as creating an anonymous link. Go to the linking settings, from here select the Specific people option and add the email addresses of the users you want to share, along with the level of access you want to give them.

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From above, the other two options available below Anyone are the options you can use to share documents with users already in the organization's folder.

Step 2: After selecting Apply, you can choose to either copy the link to clipboard or send the link via email. This will show you that only people you have specifically invited will be able to access this document. You will also be able to see who currently has access to the document.

Step 3: The invitation to the document will be sent to the guest user and it needs to be accepted. Once they've accepted the invitation, they'll need to sign in with a trusted email address, and they'll be added to their organization folder.

Share a SharePoint site with authenticated external users

Step 1: The process of sharing the entire SharePoint site with external authenticated users is almost the same as above. Navigate your way to the website and then select the Share button in the top right corner.

Step 2: After selecting this item, a pop-up will appear where you can add the personal email addresses of the users you want to invite to your website.

Step 3: Once done, the user will receive an invitation to log in and access the website. As above, if the user accepts the invitation, they are added to the organization's folder.

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