Why Healthcare Providers Can't Afford to Ignore Microsoft 365 Compliance Risks

The healthcare industry faces a perfect storm of compliance challenges - high regulatory scrutiny, exceptionally sensitive data, and increasingly distributed work environments. While Microsoft 365 has become essential infrastructure for most healthcare organizations, it also introduces significant compliance risks that many providers fail to adequately address.

Beyond financial penalties, compliance failures damage patient trust, trigger mandatory reporting requirements, and can even impact clinical operations.

Many healthcare organizations lack visibility into external sharing, what sensitive data they can see, and whether their access remains appropriate over time. When staff departures or role changes go unmanaged, outdated permissions create significant compliance exposure. Ensuring continuous oversight is essential to maintaining data security and regulatory compliance.

Secure document sharing is essential in healthcare, but the ease of creating sharing links in Microsoft 365 can lead to inappropriate access controls. Without proper monitoring, organizations may struggle to track what patient information has been shared externally, who has access to clinical documentation, whether sharing links have expiration dates, and if anonymous or organization-wide links are used for sensitive data.  

This lack of visibility creates serious HIPAA compliance risks, potentially exposing protected health information. Proper governance and monitoring are essential to safeguarding patient data and maintaining regulatory compliance.

Healthcare organizations typically experience significant staff turnover and regularly work with temporary clinical personnel. When these individuals depart, their digital access often persists in the form of orphaned accounts - users deleted from Azure/Entra ID who still have enabled permissions in SharePoint sites or active mailboxes.

These orphaned accounts create compliance vulnerabilities by potentially allowing unauthorized access to protected health information through lingering permissions.

The Audit app provides healthcare organizations with the visibility needed to address these compliance challenges. As a native Microsoft Teams application, it enables compliance officers and IT administrators to:

Audit’s Guest User Reports provide full visibility into external access in Microsoft 365. Identify guest users, their permissions, and access scope across sites and teams. With tenant-wide reporting, healthcare organizations can enforce proper governance and prevent compliance violations before they occur.

The Sharing Reports feature provides detailed insights into document sharing across SharePoint, Teams, and OneDrive. It tracks sharing links, expiration policies, and access permissions, helping healthcare providers enforce proper controls and maintain compliance.

The Orphaned Users Reports feature closes a key compliance gap by identifying deleted users with active permissions, unmanaged mailboxes, and SharePoint sites linked to non-existent accounts. This visibility helps healthcare organizations manage access throughout the employee lifecycle, ensuring outdated permissions are removed.

Healthcare providers can no longer overlook Microsoft 365 compliance risks. Strict regulations, sensitive patient data, and the complexity of modern healthcare demand a proactive compliance strategy.

Audit by SnapOn Software provides the visibility needed to prevent breaches, penalties, and reputational damage. With robust guest access management, document sharing oversight, and orphaned user controls, healthcare organizations can ensure secure collaboration while maintaining compliance.

As regulatory scrutiny intensifies, proactive compliance isn’t just best practice - it’s essential. The time to act is now, before your organization becomes the next cautionary case study.

Request a demo for Audit to see how we can help your healthcare institution today!