Help to understand the access of chat history in MS Teams Meetings - recurring meetings

[Yassin Koleilat]

Hi!

I and some colleagues at my company have discussion a very important topic regarding MS Teams meetings and the chat history.

According to MS support page about leaving or removing participants from the chat, the participant removed from a chat will be able to view previous chat history, but won't be able to send new messages, react to messages, and won't be able to view new conversations or files shared by the group.

Now the question is how about recurring meetings. Let me try to describe a scenario.

1. We have a meeting recurring 10 times, let's say once a week.
2. At the second meeting (week 2), I add a guest (within same company) to my meeting invitation via Outlook. The person attends and he/she can read and write in the meeting chat.
3. After the meeting, I as the meeting host removes this guest according to the link above.
4. The week goes on with all the original participants. 
5. The last meeting recurring, i.e. week 10, I invite the same guest or another person to the that meeting via Outlook by updating the invitation.
6. QUESTION: Will that new guest have access to the meeting chat that have been active from the first meeting? Or is it just when the person have attended the meeting and then when remove, no more access?

I'm hoping that some experts here can shed some light on this matter as it's an integrity and security matter as well.

Thanks and best regards 

Yassin Koleilat

[#2 · Accepted solution]

@Yassin Koleilat Hi Yassin, I have a similar situation with a recurring meeting where we invite guests every other week.  When you remove the guest (I remove them from the chat in Teams) they will no longer see the history.  If you invite the same guest again once they join the meeting they will be granted access to the chat again but they will not see any chats that have occurred prior to them re-joining the recurring meeting. And the meeting chat will alert you that the person has joined again. I will upload a view for you so you can see what the guest will see versus what the rest of the team will see. Once you remove the person from the chat you can feel confident they will not receive any chats that they do not need to see. Check out the screenshots below and let me know if that helps :)  Thank you.

[#3]

Thanks a lot @Ethan Stern for shedding light on this matter. It has been a question that haven't been easy to understand. It feels confident they will not receive any updates in-between the time where the guest is not invited.

Br Yassin

[#4]

No problem! I’m glad I could help. I did worry about the same thing but I liked being able to just directly remove the guest from the conversation myself. It made me feel better.