Forum Discussion

Dominic Horne's avatar
Dominic Horne
Brass Contributor
Jul 14, 2017

Help - Office 365 Backup Policy

Can someone please point me to the official O365 backup policy(link/document). I'm interested to know the backup policy for SharePoint sites and OneDrive on Office 365.

  • This is not something that is published publicly.
    If you have a look on the Office 365 Trust Center they talk about service continuity and preventing data loss, but their responsibility is only to ensure that the service is operation and data is accessible - not responsible for the backup of individual customer sites/libraries/files.
    • TonyRedmond's avatar
      TonyRedmond
      MVP

      Would anyone really take a document purporting to the the ultimate guide to Office 365 backup seriously when the text is so horribly written? https://www.systoolsgroup.com/updates/backup-recovery-policy-office-365/

       

      "Now days, Microsoft Office 365 is the most popular business productivity suite. Around 23 million users are using Office 365 application across the globe. With the help of Office 365 suite, users can work online, share many files or spreadsheets, work from their home or mobile devices. It is the perfect Cloud solution for any business."

       

      The official number for monthly active Office 365 users is 135 million, not "around 23 million." This document is no more than a thinly-disguised attempt to make people believe that they need Office 365 backups. In most case, they don't.

       

      • W. Curtis Preston's avatar
        W. Curtis Preston
        Copper Contributor

        I'm curious why you think companies don't need backup for Office 365?  Built-in tools handle things like accidentally delete emails and files, but don't handle things like:
        - accidentally or maliciously purging recycled/deleted items.

        - well meaning admin deleting or purging things they weren't supposed to 

        - malicious person gaining unauthorized access to an admin account

        - massive ransomware attack that encrypts files stored in Office365

         

        The built in tools are not built to handle these situations.

        It might be a true statement to say that most companies will not experience these things, but that's also true of traditional IT and disasters.  Yet will still have a DR plan, even though the vast majority of companies will never fire their DR plan in anger.

        So why do you believe companies don't need to backup Office 365?

  • Sal_Ziauddin's avatar
    Sal_Ziauddin
    Copper Contributor

    Dominic Horne 

    I know this quite isn't the answer you were looking for, but I do want to point out that Section 6b from the Microsoft Services Agreement states the following:

    We strive to keep the Services up and running; however, all online services suffer occasional disruptions and outages, and Microsoft is not liable for any disruption or loss you may suffer as a result. In the event of an outage, you may not be able to retrieve Your Content or Data that you’ve stored. We recommend that you regularly backup Your Content and Data that you store on the Services or store using Third-Party Apps and Services.

    https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/servicesagreement#

Resources