Compliance Problems

How to Require Justification When Users Lower a Sensitivity Label in Microsoft Purview

Phi Hung Vo Oct 12, 2026 870 views

Question details

An administrator needs to enforce a policy requiring users to provide an auditable explanation whenever they remove or lower a document's sensitivity label classification.

How to Require Justification When Lowering a Sensitivity Label

Product: Microsoft Purview
Device & OS: not provided
Scenario: Managing organizational data compliance and tracking unauthorized declassification of sensitive documents.
Observed behavior: Users are currently able to lower or remove sensitivity labels from files without providing a required, auditable reason to administrators.

Before you start

Ensure you are logged into the Microsoft Purview compliance portal with an account that has Global Administrator or Compliance Administrator permissions.

Solution 1Recommended

Enable the Justification Requirement in the Sensitivity Label Policy

You can force users to provide a reason for lowering or removing a label by editing your organization's sensitivity-label policy in the compliance portal.

When this policy is enabled, users attempting to downgrade a label will be prompted with a dialog box. They must select predefined reasons such as 'The label no longer applies', 'The label was not correct', or choose 'Other' to manually type an explanation that is logged for audits.

Access the Compliance Portal

Navigate to Label Policies

On the left navigation pane, expand 'Information protection' and click on 'Label policies'.

Edit the Target Policy

Select the sensitivity label policy that applies to your users, then click the 'Edit policy' button.

Enable the Justification Setting

Progress through the setup wizard until you reach the 'Require users to apply a label' or policy settings page. Check the box next to 'User must provide a justification to remove a label or lower its classification'.

Save and Publish

Complete the wizard and click 'Submit' or 'Save' to publish the updated policy. Allow up to 24 hours for the policy changes to propagate across your organization.

Enable the Justification Requirement in the Sensitivity Label Policy

Audit Logging: Once enabled, all user justifications are securely recorded and can be reviewed at any time using the Activity explorer in Microsoft Purview.

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Frequently Asked Questions

What options do users see when asked for a justification?

When the policy is triggered, users will see a prompt with default options such as 'The label no longer applies', 'The label was not correct', and 'Other (explain)'. If they select 'Other', they must manually type an auditable reason before the label can be changed.

Where can administrators view the justification audit logs?

Administrators can view these records in the Microsoft Purview compliance portal by navigating to the Activity explorer. The logs will detail the user, the file, the previous label, the new label, and the specific justification provided.

Does the justification prompt appear when upgrading a sensitivity label?

No. The justification requirement is specifically designed for downgrading or removing a label entirely. Applying a more restrictive label (upgrading) does not trigger the prompt.

Can I apply this justification requirement to specific users or groups only?

Yes. Since the justification setting is configured at the label policy level, you can scope the specific label policy to target only certain users, groups, or departments within your Microsoft 365 environment.

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