Forum Discussion

john john's avatar
john john
Steel Contributor
Dec 21, 2018

Can a global admin see files stored on the persoanl site (OneDrive site) for end users

Our office 365 users have personal sites, where these sites have urls such as  @ https://****-my.sharepoint.com/personal/****_**8_com . Now from time to time i received requests from users that they can not access certain files. and when i checked this further, I found that the scenario will be, as follow:-

1. that UserA send a link to a file to UserB.

2. and when UserB try to access the file, he/she will get access denied.

3. The reason is the UserA have this file stored inside his/her OneDrive site.

 

So i have this question:-

 

1. now even using the global admin, i am unable to see the file on UserA OneDrive. So is this the intended behavior? or there are some workarounds,so using the global admin, to see UserA's OneDrive's files, so i can then share them with UserB?

here is how the end user's OneDrive site looks like to the global admin (where the folder "Shared with Everyone" will be empty):-

 

onedrive
  • ChrisWebbTech's avatar
    ChrisWebbTech
    Dec 21, 2018
    Global admins cannot see files by default, you can however go add yourself explicitly to user onedrives in order to see the files via the admin center > Users > onedrive section where you can add yourself.
    Or via SharePoint Powershell using set-spouser -site "url" -loginname username -issitecollectionadmin $true

    Make sure your users are using the "Share" button, picking their option to share (Anonymous, all org, specific user) and then copy link or send message and not copying URL's from the top of their browser to link others files.
  • ChrisWebbTech's avatar
    ChrisWebbTech
    MVP
    Dec 21, 2018
    Global admins cannot see files by default, you can however go add yourself explicitly to user onedrives in order to see the files via the admin center > Users > onedrive section where you can add yourself.
    Or via SharePoint Powershell using set-spouser -site "url" -loginname username -issitecollectionadmin $true

    Make sure your users are using the "Share" button, picking their option to share (Anonymous, all org, specific user) and then copy link or send message and not copying URL's from the top of their browser to link others files.

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