Items Marked Private, Personal, or Confidential in Outlook 2000 

From time to time, you may send messages or meeting requests about sensitive personal, business, or other information that you want the recipient to handle with discretion. Or, you may have messages, contacts, tasks, and appointments that you don't want others to see if you give them access to your Microsoft Outlook® folders. To accommodate these situations, Microsoft Outlook 2000 allows you to set a sensitivity level on the item to indicate that it contains sensitive content.

Set the Sensitivity Level of an Item

By default, items have a sensitivity level set to Normal. For sensitive content, though, you can change the setting to Personal, Private, or Confidential. Use the Personal setting for content that contains personal, not business-related, information. Use the Private setting for personal or business-related content that you don't want others to see if they have access to your folders. Use the Confidential setting for business-related content to be treated according to the confidentiality policy of your company.

Note  You can preserve the sensitivity settings for messages you send across the Internet if the recipient is using a Microsoft e-mail program (other than Microsoft Outlook Express). To do this, create the message in Rich Text format (RTF), and then enable the recipient to receive RTF messages. Task requests and meeting requests are always in RTF format, but you still need to enable the recipient to receive this format. For more information, read Choose the Best Outlook 2000 Message Format for a Recipient.

To set the sensitivity level of a new item

1. Create the item.
2. With the item open, on the File menu, click Properties.
3. In the Sensitivity list, click the option you want.

In a new message, you can also set the sensitivity level by clicking the Options button on the toolbar, and then, in the Sensitivity list, clicking the option.

For meeting requests, appointments, events, tasks, and contacts of a sensitive nature, it's recommended that you use the Private setting. If you assign these items a Personal or Confidential sensitivity level and then send them to someone else, Outlook does not indicate to the recipient what the sensitivity setting is. Also, anyone with access to your folders won't know that these items are personal or confidential unless they open the item and then click Properties on the File menu.

To quickly specify the Private setting, create or open the item, and then select the Private check box at the bottom of the window.

Settings and Their Results

The following table describes how each setting affects the item for the owner, delegates or others with permission to access the owner's folders, and recipients.

Item	Setting	Result
Message
	Personal	If the recipient displays the Sensitivity column in the main Outlook window, the item's label is Personal. When the recipient opens the message, the following text is displayed at the top: Please treat this as Personal. The recipient can reply to or forward the message (including automatic forwarding using rules) and edit its original content. The recipient can change the sensitivity setting before forwarding the message. The following applies to Exchange Server users: Delegates or anyone given permission to access the owner's Inbox folder can see messages that have the Personal setting.
	Private	If the recipient displays the Sensitivity column in the main Outlook window, the item's label is Private. When the recipient opens the message, the following text is displayed at the top: Please treat this as Private. The recipient can reply to or forward the message (including automatic forwarding using rules) but cannot edit its original content. The recipient cannot change the sensitivity setting before forwarding the message. Note  If the recipient uses Word as their e-mail editor, they won't be able to open attachments to the message. To open attachments, they can temporarily turn off Word as their editor. The following applies to Exchange Server users: Delegates or anyone given permission to access the owner's Inbox folder cannot see private messages. However, the owner can Give a Delegate Permission to See Private Items.
	Confidential	If the recipient has the Sensitivity column displayed in the main Outlook window, the column displays the label Confidential. When the recipient opens the message, the following text is displayed at the top: Please treat this as Confidential. The recipient can reply to or forward the message (including automatic forwarding using rules) and edit its original content. The recipient can change the sensitivity setting before forwarding the message. The following applies to Exchange Server users: Delegates or anyone given permission to access the owner's Inbox folder can see messages that have the Confidential setting.
Meeting requests, Appointments, and All Day Events	Private	Your calendar displays an icon that looks like a key next to the item. When you print your calendar, you can hide details of private meetings, appointments, and all day events: on the File menu, click Print, and then select the Hide details of private appointments check box. The recipient can reply to or forward a meeting request (including automatic forwarding using rules) and edit its original content. A recipient cannot change the sensitivity setting before forwarding the message. The following applies to Exchange Server users: Delegates or anyone given permission to access the owner's Calendar folder cannot see private meeting, appointment, or event details on the calendar, but the calendar will show the time as unavailable. However, the owner can Give a Delegate Permission to See Private Items.
Contacts	Private	If you display the Sensitivity column in the main Outlook window, the item's label is Private. If you forward the contact, the recipient sees the following text at the top of the open message: Please treat this as Private. The recipient can open the embedded contact, which remains marked as private. If you forward the contact as a vcard (virtual business card), the recipient sees the same message as listed previously. However, if the recipient wants to keep the vcard file private, they need to open it and then select the Private check box at the bottom of the window. The following applies to Exchange Server users: Delegates or anyone given permission to access the Contact folder cannot see private contacts. If a birthday or anniversary date is entered for the contact, others won't see the dates when they view the folder owner's calendar. However, the owner can Give a Delegate Permission to See Private Items.
Tasks	Private	If you display the Sensitivity column in the main Outlook window, the item's label is Private. If the task is assigned to someone else, the assignee cannot change the Private status. The following applies to Exchange Server users: Delegates or anyone given permission to access the owner's Tasks folder cannot see private tasks. However, the owner can Give a Delegate Permission to See Private Items.

If the sensitivity settings don't provide as much protection as you want for a particular message, consider adding security to the message. For more information, type secure message in the Office Assistant or on the Answer Wizard tab in the Outlook Help window, and then click Search.