Forum Discussion

Iron Contributor

Jan 08, 2018

Solved

Recover email deleted by retention policy

Hi, Our retention policy is two years. One user requests to recover emails older than 2 years. I want to know if it is possible and how? If not, is there any software to recover emails older th...

office 365

VasilMichev
Jan 08, 2018
Well, first of all what kind of retention policy is that, the "old" Exchange-based ones, or the new ones in the SCC? What is the action you have configured, to archive messages or to delete them, and if the latter - is it soft- or hard-delete?

If the policy is set to archive messages, simply look in the corresponding folder of the Online Archive. If the messages are being deleted, follow the standard process for recovering deleted items, as detailed here: https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Recover-deleted-items-in-a-user-s-mailbox-Admin-Help-eb15194b-63ec-41b0-8d90-1823d3f558e4

VasilMichev

MVP

Jan 08, 2018

Well, first of all what kind of retention policy is that, the "old" Exchange-based ones, or the new ones in the SCC? What is the action you have configured, to archive messages or to delete them, and if the latter - is it soft- or hard-delete?

If the policy is set to archive messages, simply look in the corresponding folder of the Online Archive. If the messages are being deleted, follow the standard process for recovering deleted items, as detailed here: https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Recover-deleted-items-in-a-user-s-mailbox-Admin-Help-eb15194b-63ec-41b0-8d90-1823d3f558e4

Grace Yin
Iron Contributor
Jan 09, 2018
Hi Vasil,

Thank you very much for your reply. I just joined this company and don't know how the old administrator set up. In each email, there is a message on top like below.

We checked "Create an archive mailbox" when creating an user account.

We have on promises Exchange 2016 and Office 365. Can you tell me where I should go to check the retention policy?

Many thanks!
- TonyRedmond
  MVP
  Jan 09, 2018
  Use PowerShell to find out what retention policies exist for mailboxes:
  
  [PS] C:\> Get-Mailbox -RecipientTypeDetails UserMailbox | FT DisplayName, RetentionPolicy. ArchiveEnabled
  
  The same command works on-premises and the cloud.
  
  Basically, for archive-enabled mailboxes, the mailbox folder assistant moves any mail over 2 years old to folders in the archive. You should find the messages there - or the user can open the archive with OWA and find the message themselves.