Password Protect Your Office 365 Documents (1 minute read, Video)

Sometimes you don’t need anything complicated to increase security. You can use the tools already provided with the software you have. Protecting documents with a password is such a case.

In Office 365, it’s very easy to protect Word documents and excel spreadsheets.

Additionally, it can be a way to protect shared documents. Of course the person you want to share the document with will need the password to access it.

NOTE: Password protected documents cannot be recovered if you lose the password, so keep track of them. 

If you’re comfortable with the document security on your own machine but want to password protect a version to share, make a copy of the document and then share with a password.

The best way to share a password is through using encrypted communications like Wickr or call the recipient and give them the password.

The process is very easy.

In Word on windows go to File>Info>protect document

In Word on Mac 

Go to Review>Protect

More information from Microsoft

In Excel:

While in the document go to: Review > Protect Workbook:

For a quick demonstration of how to protect your Word documents, please see this 2 minute video:

More information from Microsoft