How to manage SharePoint Online with Copilot: steps, best practices, and full data control

¿How to manage SharePoint Online with Copilot? Modern SharePoint Online management is taking a quantum leap forward thanks to the native integration of Microsoft Copilot and the advanced management suite that Microsoft 365 puts at our fingertips. IT managers and site administrators know that balancing productivity, data control, security, and a seamless user experience can be complex. Now, the Copilot assistant becomes a key ally in transforming this complexity into agile, collaborative and secure results., both for large companies and small organizations that are committed to digital work.

But how do you manage SharePoint Online to take full advantage of Copilot? This guide is the most up-to-date and comprehensive in Spanish, built with the most relevant and recent information. Here, we show you how to implement, configure, and leverage Copilot and advanced SharePoint administration, integrating security practices, data overexposure prevention, and intelligent process and content automation—all with a practical approach tailored to the real-world work of teams.

What is Copilot in SharePoint Online and why is it the new cornerstone for administration?

Copilot is the AI-powered intelligent assistant that Microsoft has integrated into the entire 365 suite, including SharePoint Online.This assistant powers everything from content creation and management to intelligent agent management, access control, and document security. Thanks to its advanced language models and native connection to tenant permissions and data, Copilot provides contextual responses, automates tasks, and allows administrators to maintain control of information without losing agility..

In SharePoint Online, Copilot allows you to not only create and refine pages and content, but also implement life cycle policies, identify overexposure risks, support permission configuration and even interact with custom agents that help answer queries and perform complex tasks. Before continuing, we warn you that in Tecnobits We have dozens of guides on Copilot and its settings, such as this one on How to install Copilot in Office 365, may be of help to you.

Prerequisites and first steps to prepare SharePoint Online with Copilot

Before activating Copilot and getting the most out of SharePoint Online, it is essential to meet a series of requirements and do good planning.:

• Appropriate licenses: Having Microsoft 365 Copilot and, for advanced features, E5 licenses and SharePoint Advanced Management (SAM) is the foundation.
• Test environment setup: Prepare a sandbox environment where you can validate configurations without affecting daily operations.
• Pilot tests: Select a group of early adopters to test the integration and gather realistic feedback.
• Communication plan: Inform and educate users about Copilot changes and new features, minimizing friction.
• Review of access and security policies: Adjust conditional access, multi-factor authentication, and search and sharing policies to prevent risk.
• Network check and adjustment: Ensures that the infrastructure meets the connectivity and security requirements which requires Microsoft 365 Copilot.

Having a solid foundation ensures that Copilot and SharePoint will work together, securely, and efficiently. From the first moment.

SharePoint Advanced Administration: The Operations Hub for Copilot

The complement SharePoint Advanced Management (SAM) It is an essential accelerator for any organization that wants to take advantage of the intelligence and automation that Copilot offers.

• Avoid excessive sharing and cluttering data sources, improving the accuracy of the results generated by Copilot.
• Monitors the life cycle of sites and content, identifying and cleaning up what is obsolete or inactive.
• Control, restrict and audit access to documents and sites, applying intelligent policies and sensitivity labels.

Through the SAM Administration Center, you can view detailed reports, apply bulk actions, automate notifications, and synchronize security and compliance across your organization. Copilot integration adds a conversational and intelligent layer that simplifies decision-making and daily management.

Best practices and key steps to prepare SharePoint for Copilot

Data preparation, governance, and security are essential. Here are some recommendations you can't ignore:

1. Reduce accidental sharing and control permissions

In SharePoint, Avoiding overexposure is essential so that Copilot only returns relevant and authoritative information.. For it:

• Configure sharing settings at the tenant and site level, tailoring default permissions to “specific people” instead of the entire organization.
• Hides options with broad risks as “Everyone except external users” to restrict the exposure radius.
• Educates and trains site owners to manage access requests and thoroughly review who can access the data.

2. Ensure the validity of site owners

Site owners are the last line of defense for content governance and cleanliness.

• Executes property directives to detect sites without at least two clear responsible parties.
• Enable automatic notifications for these owners to validate activity, permissions, and the need to continue maintaining the site.
• Updates property records in active mode and requires periodic reviews.

3. Cleanup of inactive sites and lifecycle management

Old content is Copilot's worst enemy of accuracy.The accumulation of obsolete data disperses sources and generates confusing or irrelevant responses.

• Identifies sites without relevant activity for defined periods (3, 6, 9 or 12 months).
• Issue notifications for owners to confirm their usefulness.
• Put unnecessary items in read-only mode and schedule automatic archiving after the agreed-upon time.
• Use the reports with AI from SAM to get automatic recommendations on what actions to take.

4. Detection of potentially overshared content

With activity and permission reports you can identify hot spots of overexposure:

• Review activity reports for content shared with “anyone,” “everyone except external,” or “organization members.”
• Use the Overexposure Baseline Report to assess the number of users with access based on defined thresholds.
• Download, filter, and analyze data to react quickly to suspicious situations.

5. Control and restrict access to content

When you detect risks, Copilot helps you centralize and mitigate unauthorized access., but the decision and execution always fall to the administrator:

• Initiate access reviews with site owners.
• Restrict access to specific groups with the “Restricted Access Control (RAC)” policy so that only necessary users continue to see information, both in SharePoint and OneDrive.
• Enable the “restricted content detection” policy to hide content from Copilot and organizational search without changing permissions.
• Combine both options in the most critical areas.

6. Proactive actions in strategic sites

The organization's key sites require extra protection from the very first minute.:

• Apply RAC when provisioning new sites, avoiding oversharing from birth.
• Block downloads, especially Teams recordings, when necessary.
• Consider encryption with “extraction rights” for high-impact documents.

Integration and management of agents in SharePoint and Copilot

Another of the revolutions that Copilot brings with it is the possibility of Create, manage, and share intelligent agents in SharePoint for help, learning and automation tasks:

• Any member with editing permissions can create their own agent., which can then be edited, shared, or even approved by the site owner.
• Owners can mark an agent as “approved” and assign them as the default to be the first experience for visitors.
• Agents can be pinned, edited, or shared from the Copilot chat panel, facilitating collaboration and access.
• They can be deleted like any other file within the site, making it easy to rotate and clean up obsolete agents.

Creating rich content with Copilot in SharePoint

Copilot is not only a governance and security engine, it also revolutionizes the way you create and publish content in SharePoint.:

• Creating pages from templates: Choose from pre-designed templates like newsletters, event announcements, or updates, and customize them with smart prompts and attachments.
• Creating from open notices: Start with a sentence and let Copilot suggest structure, design, and content, adjusting the result as many times as needed.
• Design ideas: Copilot suggests visual and layout improvements to make each page attractive and professional.
• Smart Rewriting: The rich text editor allows you to refine messages, give them a natural or professional tone, or even summarize or expand information as needed.

How to add SharePoint as a knowledge source in Copilot Studio

Copilot allows you to integrate SharePoint as a data source for generative responses., which increases the relevance of the information served through agents and assistants:

1. Open the agent in Copilot Studio.
2. Click “Add knowledge” from the corresponding section.
3. Select “SharePoint” and enter the URL of the sites you want to add (you can include multiple using shift + enter).
4. Give it a name and an accurate description, as the AI ​​will use that information as context.
5. Click “Add” and define the authentication scenarios: by default Copilot Studio authenticates with Microsoft Enter ID, but you can adjust the Scopes and manual authentication if you need more restrictive scenarios.

Essential security measures for managing SharePoint Online with Copilot

Multi-factor authentication (MFA)

Enable MFA for all managed users and computers through the Microsoft 365 admin center, as well as configure conditional access policies based on risk level, location, and device.

Audit and record retention

• Enable unified audit logging in Microsoft Purview to record all user and administrator actions.
• Define retention policies based on regulatory needs and review logs periodically for anomalies.

Confidential information controls

• Export the top 100 most used sites and review potential overexposure risks with SAM and Microsoft Purview DSPM reports.
• Disable broad sharing and audit Copilot activity to prevent information leaks.
• Use sensitivity labels to classify, encrypt, and restrict data across documents, sites, and groups.

Apply and manage sensitivity labels in SharePoint with Copilot

Microsoft Purview sensitivity labels are key to protecting information and controlling how Copilot is used.:

1. Create labels from the Microsoft Purview portal and publish them to all users or only specific groups.
2. Configure whether the label only marks the content or also applies encryption and access restrictions.
3. Assign default labels to document libraries, using the option to extend protection even to downloads if you need maximum security.
4. Set up tag synchronization for sites, groups, and workspaces.
5. Use automatic service tagging for scenarios where you don't want to rely on manual user input.

Data Loss Prevention (DLP) and Adaptive Control over Sensitive Information

La data loss prevention (DLP) built into Purview helps prevent accidental leaks across all points: SharePoint, Teams, Exchange, and devices.

• Defines policies that analyze and protect sensitive data (e.g., credit cards, social security numbers, medical data).
• Take automated actions: block submissions, warn users, or trigger notification and remediation flows.
• Enable adaptive protection by connecting DLP with insider risk management to dynamically adjust the level of control based on behavioral incidents.

Continuous monitoring and auditing in Copilot and SharePoint Online

Regular reviews, log analysis, and monitoring of Copilot requests and responses are vital to maintaining security and compliance.:

• Use change history reports to audit who did what and when, both at the site and global level.
• Run these reports weekly during the initial adoption phase, and adjust the frequency thereafter.
• Use the content and activity explorer tools to monitor the application of retention and sensitivity labels, as well as potential incidents involving sensitive data.

Disable Restricted SharePoint Search (RSS) when transitioning to Copilot

RSS is a temporary solution that limits searching to permitted sites while permissions are reviewed and corrected.. When the configuration is already secure, disable RSS and allow Copilot and search to access all authorized content, increasing the accuracy and value of the responses generated.

• Disable RSS completely using PowerShell (Set-SPOTenantRestrictedSearchMode).
• Remove sites from the allowed list with Remove-SPOTenantRestrictedSearchAllowedSite.
• If you maintain RSS, make sure that only truly safe sites are included in the allowlist.

Data retention and lifecycle: eliminate unnecessary data and comply with regulations

• Use retention policies from Purview to automatically retain or delete documents, emails, and Copilot content based on legal or business needs.
• Set exceptions with specific retention labels for critical content.
• Monitor adherence and retention enforcement with reporting tools and activity explorers.

Monitors and controls the interactions and responses generated by Copilot

• Apply predefined communications compliance policies in Purview to detect inappropriate language, leaks, or misuse in Copilot requests and responses.
• Periodically review logs and audits to correct incidents and measure actual Copilot usage.

Continuous Optimization: Resources, Adoption, and Training in Copilot and SharePoint

The optimal implementation and administration of Copilot in SharePoint Online is an ongoing process.:

• Create pioneering user communities to gather feedback and identify opportunities for improvement.
• Roll out gradual adoption, monitoring impact, readiness, and satisfaction using Viva Insights tools and Microsoft 365 usage reports.
• Take advantage of Microsoft training resources and onboarding kits to scale knowledge across all teams.
• If you have a high license volume, check out FastTrack support and help options or implement co-investment projects with Microsoft and official partners..

Finally, if your organization needs even more customized scenarios, Copilot Studio and the Power Platform ecosystem allow you to extend functionality, adding specific integrations and automations, while respecting the security and governance in place.

Managing SharePoint Online in an advanced way with the help of Copilot opens a new horizon of efficiency, security and convenience.; the combination of centralized control, automation, integrated protection, and contextual help allows any team to keep their data protected, productive, and always under control. For more information on the topic, check out the Microsoft 365 Copilot official page.