Sensitivity no longer getting applied to new SharePoint team site (no Microsoft 365 group)

Question

Sensitivity no longer getting applied to new SharePoint team site (no Microsoft 365 group)

Joost van der Linden 146

Hi all,

I am using the SharePoint Online REST API to create a new team site (no Microsoft 365 group). I use the following URI:

https://tenant-admin.sharepoint.com/_api/SPSiteManager/create

Request headers:

Accept : application/json;odata.metadata=none
odata-version : 4.0

Request body:

{
"request": {
"Title": "Site name",
"Url": "/sites/MyUniqueSiteAddress",
"Lcid": 1043,
"Description": "Description of how this site will be used",
"WebTemplate": "STS#3",
"Owner": "******@domain.com",
"SensitivityLabel": "MY-OWN-SENSITIVITY-LABEL-GUID"
}
}

It worked fine from the start (from April). Sites almost get created on a daily basis. When I look at the SharePoint admin center, I see all sites have a sensitivity label until July 15th. After that date, sites do get created but they no longer have a sensitivity label and therefore they cannot be shared externally. No changes have been made to the workflow or to Purview.

The service still responds with status code 200, in the response body still SiteStatus : 2.

Anyone an idea what might have changed why this no longer works?

Best regards,

Joost

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Answer 1

Hi Joost

Thank you for reaching out.

Based on my research, the SensitivityLabel parameter in the /_api/SPSiteManager/create endpoint is still documented and supported for applying a sensitivity label when creating a non-group associated Team Site or a Communication Site. Currently, I have not found any Microsoft documentation, announcement, or known issue stating that this functionality has been deprecated or changed yet.

Reference: sp-dev-docs/docs/apis/site-creation-rest.md at main · SharePoint/sp-dev-docs · GitHub

Since the same workflow appears to have been working successfully in your tenant until approximately July 15, and no changes were made to the REST request, site template, or Purview configuration, it is possible that the behavior may be related to a recent service-side change or a backend issue rather than the API syntax itself.

To help investigate this issue further, I recommend engaging with [GitHub Community Forum] for a deeper technical dive or to connect with individuals who have relevant experience and expertise. Some approaches may behave differently or be restricted depending on your specific environment and configuration. These forums include many experienced developers and Microsoft specialists who can assist with troubleshooting and guidance. If further investigation is required, they may also be able to escalate the issue to the appropriate internal engineering team.

Apologies for redirecting you to the related development team support. As moderator in this community, I do not have access to your specific tenant configuration, and my testing environment is limited. Therefore, my guidance is based on available Microsoft documentation and resources. That said, I’ll do my best to provide additional insight where possible.

If you have any additional concerns, feel free to comment below. I would be more than happy to assist.

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