Dynamics 365 Business Central gets new tools for data classification

Last month, Microsoft reintroduced Dynamics NAV as Dynamics 365 Business Central, signaling a more modular approach in the way the enterprise resource planning (ERP) solution was offered. Today, the tech giant has unveiled new tools for data classification in Business Central.

The Data Classification module in the service helps companies work towards ensuring privacy compliance, particularly in the post-GDPR era. With regards to this update, all existing data classification capabilities have been moved to the module, essentially consolidating them in a single place. These include the Data Classification Worksheet and Wizard pages, and the Data Classification Mgt. codeunit.

Various options are provided for classifying data through Worksheet and Wizard Pages. For example, users can export an Excel file with all sensitive fields classified, and then import the file to add the required classifications. Alternatively, data can be classified using functionality provided by Business Central.

Here are all the capabilities the Data Classification module is noted to provide:

Creating an entry in the Data Sensitivity table for every field in the database that might contain sensitive information

Setting the data sensitivity for fields

Synchronizing the Data Sensitivity and Field tables by introducing new entries in the Data Sensitivity table for every new entry in the Field table

Querying whether all the fields are classified

Querying whether the Data Sensitivity table is empty for the current company

Inserting a new data sensitivity entry for fields in the database

Inserting a new data privacy entities entry for tables in the database

Getting the date for the last time the Field and Data Sensitivity tables were synchronized

Raising an event to retrieve all data privacy entities

Microsoft also announced the Business Applications Virtual Event today, in order to give a more in-depth look at the improvements being brought to Dynamics 365 - with the 2019 release wave 2 hitting general availability next month.