Data Owners

A Data Owner is a person that owns one or more data targets (like file paths, mailboxes, etc.). Adding Data Owners is not a required step in configuration, but they can be very useful. Data Owners may be used as Data Targets when creating a Data Governance policy, or as custodians in an eDiscovery matter.

Viewing Data Owners

The list of Data Owners configured in Gimmal Discover can be accessed from the Configuration section of the Administration module of the console. Typically, Data Owners are added to Discover by performing a query against a specified Active Directory or Azure Active Directory group. They can, however, also be added manually.

 The Action button on the Data Owners toolbar includes these options: 

• Add Owner – This allows for the addition of a person manually. This option may be used to tie in users no longer in the organization's Active Directory environment.

  Edit Owner – Opens the Owner Edit window to change the properties of the person. This option is only available for Owners added manually.

  Delete Owner- Will prompt you and then remove the person. Please note that if the Owner was added from an Active Directory People Search and the user still exists in the AD search path, the user will be re-added the next time the search is run.

 The More button on the Data Owners toolbar includes these options: 

• Show Owners/Show Devices – These two options toggle between listing the People and the Devices that are configured in Gimmal Discover.

  Cleanup Devices – This option is only available when Devices are displayed. It provides a way to remove orphan Devices from the Gimmal Discover configuration. Orphan Devices have no Data Targets assigned to them. 

Adding Owners

Data Owners may be added to Gimmal Discover either through Active Directory searches, Azure Active Directory searches, or by manually adding them one at a time. To add Owners through an AD or Azure AD search, create a Data Target Search. 

If you plan to use Azure AD please refer to the Azure AD Certificate Installation document for information on installing the appropriate certificate. 

When added through a search, Owner details are updated each time the search is performed. Owners are never automatically removed from Discover if they are no longer found by a search since they may be associated with historical reports, searches, etc. 

To manually create a new Data Owner click the New Owner toolbar button. You may edit a person by clicking the checkbox next to the person entry and clicking the Edit Person button from the toolbar.

 The Edit and Create Person popup contains the following fields: 

• Display Name – Enter a combined name used when referencing this person. This is the primary method of identifying this person in the selection views.

• First Name – Enter the first name of this owner

• Middle Name – Enter the middle name of this owner

• Last Name - Enter the last name of this owner

• Email Address - Enter an email address for this owner

• Office - Enter an office for this owner

• Description - Enter a description for this owner

• Manage this person - Check to include this owner for policy processing. When unchecked, this owner will not be processed as part of a policy

Assigning Data Targets to Owners

Whenever possible, Discover will automatically map Data Targets to the corresponding owner. This matching is typically performed using the email address. There are also two other ways to assign data targets to an owner, both of these are available from the Data Targets view:

• Administrators may manually select one or more targets and use the Map Owner button on the toolbar to link those targets with a specific owner.

AutoMap owner is a feature that allows administrators to define mapping options that Discover will use to attempt to match a target with the correct owner. For example, if your organization has user home drives on a network share in folders named with “first name.last name”, that convention could be used to attempt auto mapping.