Delegate access to email

You can give other people access to your email account so they can receive email messages and meeting requests and respond on your behalf. If you need to do this you must do it using delegate access - never give anyone else your password. Microsoft recommend that all parties using delegate access should be using the same version of Outlook.

Find out more about delegate access, permission levels and how to set it up from the Microsoft Support site or watch this short video

Emailing documents

You can send confidential and highly confidential information by email, but you must:

• Check the recipient address carefully to make sure you don’t accidentally send it to the wrong person
• Make sure you are not sending more information than you need to eg there are no extra tabs on Excel worksheets
• Use an encrypted attachment (see below) to send highly confidential data. If the file has a password, you must send this via a separate method and must not include it in the email. If you are unsure about the level of confidentiality of your data, encrypt it.
• Let the people you are sharing the attachment with know in advance - otherwise they might think your email is a phishing email.
• Never send the password to an encrypted file in the same email. It is better to let them know by another method eg phone. 

Creating an encrypted attachment

Add a password to Microsoft Office files

You can add a password to Microsoft Office files (eg Word, Excel etc). Visit the Microsoft Support site to find out more information.

Create an encrypted Zip file

You can create an encrypted Zip file using 7-Zip file manager which is available on University-owned computers, in computer clusters and on the Virtual Windows Desktop (through AppsAnywhere) (A zip file is a way of packing one or more files into a single file or folder, which usually takes up less space than the original files).

To run 7-Zip, on Windows 7 machines click the Start button and type 7-Zip into the search box. On Windows 10 machines, click the Start button and start typing 7-Zip. Click on 7-Zip in the list of results to open it.

For full instructions on how to use 7-Zip, click on the Help menu in the package.

Sharing over OneDrive

By default, only you can access your files on OneDrive – University of Leeds. You can choose to share single files or whole folders with people from within the University and outside.  Follow the instructions on the Microsoft Support website (remember to look at the OneDrive – Business instructions, not OneDrive – Personal).

To share with someone outside the University:

• go to the folder that contains the file you want to share in OneDrive
• right-click on the file name and choose Share, or hover over the file name and click the three vertical dots next to the file name and choose Share
• The Send Link dialog will open
• Make sure you change the link setting at the top to ‘Specific people’ (the default is ‘Anyone with this link can edit’) and choose whether or not to allow them to edit (as well as view) the file, then click Apply
• Enter their email address
• Add a message to explain what the file is you are sharing with them and why
• Click Send

They will now receive an email with a link to the file. When they click on the link, they will need to follow the instructions to verify their identity. You will receive an email when they click on the link.

When sharing a file we recommend:

• You only share with named people and do not use the option that gives access to anyone who has the link
• Review who you have shared your files with regularly, and remove access when it is no longer needed.

You can find out more about the security of OneDrive on the IT website