Understand data protection and governance tasks for Microsoft 365 and Copilot
Compliance Posture, Exploration, and eDiscovery
Select the right Purview view for compliance recommendations, sensitive-item inventory, user activity, AI risk, or content search.
What you need to know
- Compliance Manager maps requirements to improvement actions and provides a compliance score; it does not certify compliance.
- Data Explorer shows a snapshot of classified or labeled items; Activity explorer shows actions users and systems took on sensitive content.
- The current Data Security Posture Management experience unifies visibility into sensitive-data and AI risks; the guide still uses the DSPM for AI objective name.
- Microsoft Purview eDiscovery search locates relevant files, email, and other supported content for an investigation.
Objects and administrative surfaces
- Assessments and improvement actions — Compliance Manager.
- Items and classifications — Data Explorer; activities — Activity explorer.
- AI use and sensitive-data posture — Data Security Posture Management.
- Cases, sources, queries, statistics, review, and export — eDiscovery.
How it works
- Each tool answers a different question: posture, where data exists, what happened to it, how AI interacts with it, or what content is responsive.
- Current DSPM consolidates signals from multiple Purview solutions; DSPM for AI (classic) is documented separately.
When to use it
- Use Compliance Manager for recommended compliance actions, Data Explorer for inventory, Activity explorer for behavior, DSPM for AI-related posture, and eDiscovery for scoped content search.
Security and governance implications
- Restrict content-viewer and investigator roles; search capability can expose sensitive data.
- A score or alert should lead to evidence-based review, not an automatic legal conclusion.
Troubleshooting signals
- Clarify whether the administrator needs items, activities, recommendations, AI posture, or investigation content.
- Check roles, data availability delays, scope, and query conditions.
Exam traps
- Data Explorer and Activity explorer are not interchangeable.
- Compliance Manager provides posture guidance; eDiscovery retrieves responsive content.
Key takeaways
- Items → Data Explorer; actions → Activity explorer; requirements → Compliance Manager; AI posture → DSPM; investigation search → eDiscovery.
- Use current DSPM terminology while recognizing the blueprint’s DSPM for AI label.
Related objectives
- D2.3.a
- D2.3.b
- D2.3.f
- D2.3.g
- D2.3.h