Google announces Content Manager role and security features for Team Drive

To improve user access to Team Drive content, Google has developed a new Content Manager role and implemented additional security features.

Content Manager

Available later this month, the new Content Manager role:

  • Will become the default role for new members of the Team Drive.
  • Will allow members to create, edit, move, and delete content.
  • Can not alter Team Drive membership or settings.

In addition, Google is also changing the names of current roles in Team Drive to align with their permissions. The new roles will be:

  • Manager, formerly Full access.
  • Content Manager, new
  • Contributor, formerly Edit access
  • Commenter, formerly Comment access
  • Viewer, formerly View access

There are two important differences between the permissions for Content Managers and Contributors who only have edit access in Team Drive:

  • Unlike Contributors, Content Managers will be able to reorganize and delete files in a Team Drive.
  • Content Managers also will have read and write access to files in Drive File Stream, allowing them to easily manage Team Drive files via their computer’s file system or the Drive web interface. Contributors, however, will need to access Team Drive files online to edit them.

Note: Individuals with “full access” permission will need to manually change current membership roles to Content Manager, if so desired.

Google Security Features
Google recently introduced new security features that you can configure in Team Drive. They include:

  • Sharing of content outside of the university’s Gmail domain.
  • Sharing with non-Team Drive members.
  • Download, print and copy options for commenters and viewers.

To locate these options, select Team Drive Settings from the drop-down menu of your Team Drive.