Share 365 data with a link
- Dan Jakubiak
Students, faculty, and staff may follow this section when they need to post a link to OneDrive or SharePoint items (ex. on a webpage), rather than sending them directly to recipients.
If you share the link with “specific recipients”, they cannot share the link without your permission. You will receive an email with a request to share the file with others and have the option to accept or decline.
Visit s.uconn.edu/onedrive or s.uconn.edu/sharepoint and find the file/folder you wish to share.
These steps can also be completed using File Explorer or Finder.Right click on the item you wish the share and click on Share.
In the Copy link button that sits inside of the popup window, click on the gear icon to open the sharing settings.
Click on “People in the University of Connecticut” to allow anyone with an @uconn.edu email address to open the item.
Be cautious when using the Anyone option: This is not recommended. This option allows you to share your file/folder with anyone on the planet. Anyone may view/edit the file without authentication (signing in). This means anyone who obtains the share link can edit the data.
When choosing the “Anyone” option, you are given extra tools to help with security. Only when choosing “Anyone”, you may also set a password to access the data and an expiration date for the share link. After this date, or without the password, a user cannot access the data behind the share link. Please see Share Microsoft 365 files with External Users for more information on the external user expeirence.
People with existing access can be thought of sending a reminder/notification to the recipients since they already have access.
Next, look at the Other settings portion:
Can edit allows those who click on the link the ability to edit the file(s)
Can view allows those who click on the link only view access; they cannot edit the file(s)
Then you will see Block download as a final option. When sharing files online, always remember that restricting downloads isn’t always a foolproof security tool.
For example, if you share a word document, even with view-only access, a user may simply highlight all of the text and copy-paste it into their own document. The user hasn’t downloaded a file from you, but they have obtained its information.Click Apply.
Copy the link and then distribute it as needed!
