SPO - File vanished from a document library?

[Rob Clarke]

Hi,

I've been working with SharePoint since 2008 and I've always told users/customers that you'll never loose data in SharePoint from the usual user mistakes i.e. deleting, renaming etc, so long as the files remain within SharePoint you'll always find them.

So imagine my surprise today when I go to retrieve a file a user (external) had uploaded to one of my SPO sites and I discover it's gone.  I had checked previously the file was there.  So I thought, no worries I bet the user accidentally deleted it, check the recycle bin and the secondary and both are empty.

Scratching my head now...so I pop off to the Office 365 Audit logs and do a search for the file.  I can see the file being uploaded by the user but after that there are no more activities on the file.  Nothing to suggest it was deleted, moved or even viewed.  There are no Flows, SP2013 workflows associated with the document library.

Has anyone seen anything similar in their tenants?

Cheers

Rob

[#2]

Hi @Rob Clarke,

Does the missing document need to be published? Not sure what your library settings are but it could simply be a minor version and not major version of the file.

I hope this helps.

Norm

[#3]

Hi @Norman Young 

Thanks for the response, sadly nothing that easy.  The site is a basic classic team site template and the document library is the default "Shared Documents".

Cheers

Rob

[#4]

Hi @Rob Clarke,

The other thing that comes to mind, is if the document has been blocked (i.e. virus, malware, compliance etc). The up-loader would see a "signal" on the document indicating an issue and I don't believe anyone else would see it. 

Norm

[#5]

Just to close this one off, the issue was that the file the user was uploading was 400Mb which they drag-dropped onto the document library.  Although the file appeared to be in the library the upload was still running and then the user closed their browser...the upload stopped and the file "vanished".  I'm not sure why the file appeared in the library before the upload had completed.