Forum Discussion
Teams retention policy
I am currently working on testing a Teams chat deletion retention policy with the goal of deleting the 1:1 chat history for some users in our organisation after a specified amount of time while retaining it for others. Since a copy of a user's chat history is stored in a hidden folder in their mailbox, I initially thought this would be possible.
During testing, we encountered an issue. We have two groups of users: users A & B are part of the retention policy configured to delete chat history after 1 day, while users C & D are not part of the policy. When the policy is applied, it successfully deletes the chat history for users A & B. However, it also deletes the chat history for users C & D for any chats they have had with users A or B.
Based on various online sources, there seems to be conflicting information regarding whether it is possible to retain the chat history for users C & D in their interactions with users A & B who are part of the policy. Some sources suggest it can be done, other say once the Azure chat service in the backend receives the deletion command from the policy, it will delete all chat history for users that are part of the policy, even if it means deleting it for a user who is not part of the policy.
My question is, is it possible to delete chat history for some users while retaining that same chat history for others who are not part of the policy? If not, this could present a challenge in rolling out this retention policy, as users who are not part of the policy may notice that some of their chat history (specifically chats they have had with users to whom the retention policy is being applied) is missing.
Any guidance on this matter would be greatly appreciated...
2 Replies
I suppose the logic here is to clear it from all participant's mailboxes, as each of them gets a copy of group conversations. Tony Redmond might have played with this scenario and probably has something to say about it.
Further testing has confirmed that if a retention policy configured to delete Teams chat history is applied to users A & B is will also delete that same chat history (meeting or 1:1 chat) for any other user that has been part of that chat even if they are not part of the policy. I guess the logic here is that if for example chat history for a department within an organisation had to be deleted for compliance reasons then if a copy of that chat was still sitting in the chat history of another user from a different department then it wouldnt really be compliant. It could just come as a surprise to users who are not part of the policy to suddenly see some of their chat and meeting history disappear from Teams...
