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Data Sensitivity Labels for Data Management | New in Tableau 2023.2

Tableau 2023.2 adds sensitivity labels for your data, and they are built API-first so you can import existing tags rather than label everything by hand.

Tim Ngwena •6 July 2023 •1 min read •7 min watch •2K

Part ofWhat's new in Tableau 2023.2

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Sensitivity labels can be applied at two levels: on an asset (data source, workbook, connection) via the three-dot menu, or on specific columns from the table page.
By default there is only one built-in label, 'Sensitive data', but administrators can use the REST API to create or rename values like public, internal, confidential, restricted and mission critical.
The feature is built API-first, so existing sensitivity tags stored elsewhere can be imported into Tableau rather than tagged manually field by field.
Sensitivity labels require the Data Management add-on, which also enables Prep Conductor and metadata/lineage management.
Tableau Server only gets releases every six months, so 2023.2 ships to Cloud first and Server follows in the next release.
To find current documentation, use the Tableau Release Navigator, as the standard help drop-down version number is no longer being kept up to date.

0:00Hey, it's Tim here in 23.2 Tableau have

0:02added the capability of adding sensitivity

0:05labels to

0:06your data set as part of the data

0:07management add-on as part of data lineages.

0:09There's a whole tree of

0:10features nonetheless as ever let me show

0:12you how this works let's get started. Okay

0:14so there's two

0:15places that you can edit this label it's on

0:17the data sort on any specific asset or on a

0:20specific

0:21column inside of a data set so you can see

0:23here I'm inside of this top salesperson

0:25data source

0:26and it's already marked certified and it's

0:28got the sensitivity label to add the

0:30sensitivity label or

0:32change it you just go to these three dots

0:34you get the typical drop down menu you get

0:36with all Tableau

0:37assets and then in there you'll see a new

0:39option there for sensitivity label if you

0:41click that

0:42you'll see that that is pretty much the

0:43only label in this particular group of

0:45labels what is

0:47interesting is they might add other types

0:49of labels for example PII data might become

0:52a

0:52sensitivity label sort of a separate like

0:55level if that makes sense in this event in

0:57this video

0:58um in this menu and so what you can do is

1:00you can show the label you can hide the

1:02label all that

1:02does is switches it on and off and you can

1:04give a little bit of a message and context

1:06this message

1:07appears when you click on it so when you

1:09click on that it actually automatically

1:12expands the

1:12label immediately and allows you to close

1:15it the interesting thing is it suggests

1:17that there's also

1:18multiple ways you can add this and I've not

1:21actually been able to get the second

1:23way of adding sensitivity labels to work

1:25and that is on specific fields what should

1:27happen

1:28according to documentation is if you go

1:30ahead and tick one of these options the

1:32action button should

1:33appear and once the action button appears

1:35you should then be able to mark this

1:37particular field

1:38as sensitive so sensitivity label will

1:41appear right here if I actually go to the

1:43documentation

1:44on this let's go to um the documentation

1:47recently has become a bit of a funny thing

1:50so let me just

1:51finish this and I'll explain that in a

1:53second you can see here there's two ways of

1:54doing it

1:55adding sensitivity label to the asset the

1:57data source the workbook the connection

1:59or you can add it on the table page to

2:02specific item and they actually show you

2:04the process of

2:06going that going through and doing that and

2:08how it appears so you can see here appears

2:10this is the

2:11one I showed you already on the asset and

2:13this is one specifically on the column and

2:15the nice thing

2:16is when it appears in the column let's say

2:19this particular data source has four

2:21sensitive labels

2:22and it will appear as this sort of numer

2:24ated label so it will have sensitive data

2:27and the number of

2:28sensitive items as part of that asset so

2:30the data source itself might be sensitive

2:32but also the

2:32fields might be sensitive and you'll get a

2:34number of how many sensitive fields are in

2:36there and this

2:36is just a nice way of using this now what

2:39they also talk about is the fact that this

2:41is API first

2:43so there is only one built-in sensitivity

2:46label sensitive data at the moment using

2:49the rest API

2:50an administrator can create new sensitivity

2:52label values or change the name and

2:54description of an

2:55existing one typical additions name and

2:57descriptions might be public internal

3:00confidential

3:01restricted and mission critical so by

3:03default you get one but admins can go in

3:05and add more

3:06and this also suggests that there's a

3:08little bit of an API capability to tag

3:10specific items so no

3:12one's expecting you to go through your

3:14tableau server and go manually finding

3:15every single field

3:17there should really be an API to be able to

3:19go and do this but I don't know anywhere

3:20near enough

3:21about the API to actually validate whether

3:23that is possible but that seems to be the

3:25claim by

3:26tableau that it's built API first so if it

3:28's built that way let's hope that that is

3:30actually possible

3:31let me know in the comments if you are able

3:33to validate that where I'm getting that API

3:35first

3:35sort of terminology if I go here to the

3:39tableau renew new releases setup you can

3:42see here that

3:43you get this sort of text and this feature

3:46was built API first so no matter where you

3:49store

3:49sensitive information today you can import

3:52them into tableau so that suggests that

3:54there is a

3:54capability to get the information and then

3:57import that sort of tagging in into tableau

4:00fairly easily

4:01without you having to do a lot of rework so

4:03nice small feature it's part of the data

4:06management

4:06add-on so you do have to have that enabled

4:08data management add-on gives you the

4:10capability to do

4:12things like tableau prep conductor and

4:14manage metadata and lineage inside of the

4:17product itself

4:18although you can use a metadata API to

4:20extract that data and do it yourself

4:22manually if you

4:23wanted to so that's pretty much it now what

4:25I was alluding to earlier is that man table

4:28au

4:28documentation has become really difficult

4:30to sort of find if you go to what I used to

4:32do which is

4:33go to the help page you can see nothing's

4:35been updated since 22.1 and I used to go to

4:38this

4:38religiously as a way of going to find the

4:40documentation now the funny thing is it has

4:43been updated they're just not bothering

4:44updating the number on that drop down so it

4:46's almost like

4:47they've forgotten that this exists and if

4:49you go into that and select what's new it

4:51does actually

4:52generally default to the latest version and

4:54you can see here that it's saying tableau

4:56cloud march

4:572020 march 2020 20 whoa march 2020.3 okay

5:01now the problem is is that when I actually

5:04look at that

5:04and I go to something else called the table

5:06au release navigator the tableau release

5:09navigator

5:09suggests is actually a newer release and so

5:12even the page itself is not being kept up

5:15to date with

5:15the same visualization it really doesn't

5:17make sense so to find the documentation

5:19what I did is

5:20I went to the tableau release navigator I

5:22've made a video on this go ahead and check

5:24it out I'll put

5:24a link in the description and from there

5:27you can then go and see the June release of

5:29tableau cloud

5:30go in there and you can see everything that

5:31's new they also do mark what's changed so

5:33if there's a

5:34change behavior that also gets nicely

5:35marked and many people keep asking me what

5:37's where's the

5:38server release server does not get releases

5:40every release it only gets releases every

5:43six months

5:43so this release does not have tableau

5:45server the next release will okay that's

5:48pretty much it for

5:49this video and this documentation stuff is

5:51really frustrating me because tableau

5:54fantastic how let's

5:55quit again this documentation stuff is

5:57really getting to me because it's never now

6:00easy to just

6:01go and find the original source of

6:02something coming to a viz to click on the

6:04link inside of

6:05this when it could just be updated on the

6:07web page where most people are searching

6:09for it

6:09and it would just be a much better

6:10experience but nonetheless that's that's

6:13not what's happening

6:14so we're just going to have to wait but

6:15anyway this is where I got the sensitivity

6:17labels

6:17documentation I clicked on that and at

6:19least somewhere someone somewhere is doing

6:22the good

6:22work of making this easily to find through

6:24that workbook thanks for watching and I'll

6:27see you in

6:27the next video

6:28you

6:28you

6:38[ Silence ]

Rollup

Tableau 2023.2 lets you tag data sources, workbooks, connections and individual columns with sensitivity labels, and the feature is built API-first so organisations can import existing classification tags rather than label everything by hand.

This is part of the Data Management add-on, tied into data lineage features. Tim walks through where labels live in the UI and what the API-first design implies for rolling this out at scale.

The Breakdown

Add a label to an asset 0:15

On any data source, workbook or connection, open the three-dot menu and choose the sensitivity label option. From there you can show or hide the label and add a message that expands with context when someone clicks it.
Label specific columns 1:25

Documentation says you can also tick a field on the table page to reveal an action button that marks that column as sensitive; when an asset has multiple tagged fields it shows a numbered label indicating how many sensitive items it contains. Tim couldn't get this column-level path to work himself despite following the documented steps.
Only one label exists by default 2:39

Out of the box there's a single built-in label, 'Sensitive data' — everything else is up to you to define.
Requires the Data Management add-on 4:02

Sensitivity labels only work if you have this add-on enabled, which also unlocks Prep Conductor and metadata/lineage management — though you can pull metadata yourself via the metadata API without it.
Finding current documentation is broken 4:26

The old Help drop-down version number hasn't been updated since 22.1 even though the underlying pages have changed, so it's unreliable. Use the Tableau Release Navigator instead to see what's actually new and what's changed in each release.
Server releases lag Cloud by six months 5:41

New features like this ship to Tableau Cloud first; Tableau Server only gets releases twice a year, so this feature isn't in Server yet and will land in the following release.

Worth Knowing

The column-level tagging workflow shown in the documentation didn't work for Tim when he tried it — he couldn't get the action button to appear as described.
Tim hasn't validated whether the API-first tagging import actually works in practice, only that Tableau claims it's built that way.
The Help page's version number is stale and no longer reflects the real state of the documentation, which can mislead you into thinking nothing's changed.

Use It When

Reach for this when your organisation already classifies data sensitivity elsewhere and you want to bring that classification into Tableau via API rather than manually tagging every source and field.

How this Rollup was made provenance & method

A Rollup is drafted by AI from the video's transcript, then reviewed and edited by Tim. Everything used to produce this one is listed below — the model, the exact prompt, and the source video — so the process is transparent and reproducible.

Transcription: On-device — NVIDIA Parakeet v3 for recent videos, OpenAI Whisper large-v3 for earlier ones. The transcript never leaves the machine or gets published.
Drafting: Claude Sonnet 5 in the cloud, from that transcript.
Prompt: The exact Rollup prompt (v2) — the full system prompt, unedited.
Source video: Watch on YouTube
Drafted: 5 July 2026 at 09:38
Reviewed & edited: 5 July 2026 at 09:41 · by Tim Ngwena

Model + prompt + video is everything you'd need to recreate a Rollup like this yourself. The one thing we don't share is the transcript.

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