Blog Post

Microsoft OneDrive Blog

4 MIN READ

OneDrive Roadmap Roundup – June 2019

Bronze Contributor

Jul 01, 2019

As we wrap up an exciting quarter filled with innovations and announcements, we have some great new features to share with you.

Here is the latest and greatest that landed in production in the month of June 2019.

Password protected Anyone sharing links
New files experience in Outlook mobile
External sharing with AAD B2B (Preview)
OneDrive sync client B2B sync across organizations

Password protected Anyone sharing links

Roadmap ID: 27018

OneDrive is the files app for Microsoft 365, and it is a powerful sharing tool, too. Sharing can be managed and customized by broad or granular policies.

In our continuous effort to empower end users to share securely and have full control over their shared content, we are happy to announce that we have now added the ability to set custom passwords while sharing a file or folder with anyone links to their colleagues within or outside their organization. You can share the password separately with your intended recipients and they will be required to enter the password in order to access the shared content. If they accidentally forward or re-share the shared link, anyone without the password will not be able to gain access.

Sender and Receiver experience for password protected Anyone links

New files experience in Outlook mobile

Roadmap ID: 27015

With this new feature, we have rolled out a new and improved file picking experience to Outlook mobile that lets you quickly and easily attach files you are working with across Microsoft 365. Now, when you attach a file , you will be able to easily navigate and browse though all files and folders across your OneDrive as well as frequently accessed and followed shared libraries. A list of " Recent Files" gives you easy access to the content you have been working on currently and provides a similar Recent experience to what you see when attaching a file in Outlook on your desktop. You also have the option to chose files from the various attachments that have been shared with you over email.

New files experience in Outlook mobile

External sharing with B2B integration (Preview)

Roadmap ID: 33415

We are taking necessary steps in enhancing controls over Business-to-Business (B2B) collaboration. Azure AD B2B platform enables external users to exist in your Azure AD directory as “Guests” and can be managed in the way you are already familiar with.

This new feature integrates external sharing in SharePoint and OneDrive with Azure AD B2B. It includes external sharing of files, folders, list items, document libraries and sites. The integration also expands the one-time passcode authentication experience to SharePoint sites and lists when sharing with external recipients who don't already have a work, school or a Microsoft account (MSA).

With the integration turned on, when a user shares an item in SharePoint or OneDrive with an external user, a “Guest” account is immediately created for that external user (if one does not already exist). As a result, any sign-in or conditional access policies in place in your organization will take effect on those external users as well.

Note: This integration is opt-in during preview and so this roll out will not affect you unless you opt in.

To learn more refer here

OneDrive sync client B2B Sync across organizations

Roadmap ID: 33413

Along with facilitating controls over external sharing between businesses, we are also rolling out capabilities in the OneDrive sync client to let users sync libraries or folders that have been shared from other organizations. Now you can sync content shared not only by peers within your own organization, but also by partners, customers, external contractors, suppliers and third-party vendors outside of your organization that you regularly collaborate with.

This feature works in tandem with the external sharing integration (above feature) and requires recipients to have a “Guest” account in Azure AD to make B2B collaboration possible. Linking a user’s guest account at one organization to a member account at another organization enables single sign-in access to all content they have access to from their own organization and from any other organization that has created a guest account for them.

For more information and detailed guidance please refer here.

Learn more and stay engaged

As you can see, we continue to evolve OneDrive as a place to access, share, and collaborate on all your files in Office 365, keeping them protected and readily accessible on all your devices, anywhere.

You can stay up-to-date on all things via the OneDrive Blog and take advantage of end-user training resources on our Office support center.

Thank you again for your support of OneDrive. We look forward to your continued feedback on UserVoice and hope to connect with you at Ignite or another upcoming Microsoft or community-led event.

Thanks for your time reading all about OneDrive,

Ankita Kirti – Product Manager – OneDrive | Microsoft

Updated Jul 03, 2019

Version 2.0

onedrive message center

Bronze Contributor

Joined December 13, 2016

View Profile

Microsoft OneDrive Blog

Exclusive OneDrive updates, news, and feature release information.

18 Comments

Niklas Murr
Copper Contributor
Jul 02, 2019
StephenRice ChrisWebbTech Sure it seems odd at first.
Imagine that we as a company release a file with sensitive data to an external partner. We cannot control what security measures they have taken. If the partner with the release has an authorization to his mailbox as a holiday replacement, this third factor comes to bear. Furthermore the functionalities like block download as well as the link expiration date would make a lot more sense for external sharing with specific people.
Like many companies, we have deactivated the anyone link for security reasons and replaced our cryptshare (solely used for external sharing) with OneDrive. It would be great to see more security features for external sharing with OneDrive.
StephenRice
Microsoft
Jul 02, 2019
Rune Myrhaug, Can you share more about the cases where you see issues here? We've generally tried to architect this system so these kinds of cases still work but a specific example where you are running into trouble would be helpful in diagnosing.

Niklas Murr, ChrisWebbTech, password protected links are only available for Anyone links today though we certainly may extend it to other link types in the future. Password protecting specific people links is a little odd (it kind of works like a second factor of authentication) but really Chris is correct that it is mostly redundant. Where password protected links are most helpful is in ensuring that links that are broadly accessible still have an additional layer of control that prevents accidental resharing (if you accidentally post that anyone link on a public website, it won't actually give anyone access).

As for expiration, we're working very hard on the expiring external access feature (it actually happens on a per site level, not a per link level). You should hear more about that soon. Thanks!

Stephen Rice

OneDrive Program Manager II
ChrisWebbTech
MVP
Jul 02, 2019
I don’t see the Point for passwords on specific people. They get direct access to files and their password is their account authentication. I could possibly see a password option on org wide links but not specific people.
Niklas Murr
Copper Contributor
Jul 02, 2019
Nice to see these features being rolled out. Especially cool is the feature with the password-protected links. At the moment it will only work for everyone. Is it planned to make it also available for specific-people-links? If yes, is there already a date here? Also this was announced at the same time as the expiry date for links which is already available in targeted tenants. Are there any plans to release this in the next month? Thanks in advance and keep up with your awesome features and roundups!
Rune Myrhaug
Brass Contributor
Jul 02, 2019
StephenRice In B2B (External AzureAD) collaboration I see a lot of situations where the guest users UPN (User Principal Name) is not equal the users Email. This causes a lot of frustration/problems with OneDrive/Sharepoint sharing. Is it any ongoing work to do anything around this? In my opinion the B2B/Sharpoint should be able to do an internal/automatic mapping both ways between UPN <---> Email (Including email aliases)
StephenRice
Microsoft
Jul 01, 2019
TobiasAT, you are correct, the previous "Secure Links" announcement mentioned that we are bringing One Time Passcode (OTP) experiences to sharing for files and folders. The primary motivation for that change was to not require recipients to create an account in order to be able to collaborate. In addition to the other value that Azure B2B integration brings, this preview keeps that behavior: if you don't already have an account, you authenticate via OTP instead of creating an account (but if you already have an account, you will keep using that account).

ChrisWebbTech, glad you think so! Certainly more awesome stuff coming! I'll pass the feedback along to our UserVoice owners and tell them to get their act together ;)

Stephen Rice

OneDrive Program Manager II
ChrisWebbTech
MVP
Jul 01, 2019
Great stuff. Noticed these all lighting up recently. Almost to the point where it's getting harder to think of things OneDrive could use feature wise, which is a good thing!

P.S. The Uservoice site redesign was nice, but there are so many items that have been completed or announced that are marked as "Thinking about it" etc. that need updated. Basically seems someone lost the job of updating it, and hasn't been taken back up :P
TobiasAT
Iron Contributor
Jul 01, 2019
External sharing with B2B integration
It includes external sharing of files, folders, list items, document libraries and sites. The integration also expands the one-time passcode authentication experience to SharePoint sites and lists when sharing with external recipients who don't already have a work, school or a Microsoft account (MSA).
When you announced Secure Links in October 2017, the sharing for folder and files was possible for non Microsoft accounts, e.g. a Gmail or other private, external accounts. I tested and confirmed this behavior with several accounts.

A quote from the previous announcement:
Secure links allow external recipients to access files and folders securely without requiring them to create or maintain a Microsoft account.
I try to find a post where Microsoft describes that this feature was limited to work, school or Microsoft accounts after the rollout? Maybe you can help me to find the post or announcement?