Forum Discussion

Robert Allen's avatar
Robert Allen
Copper Contributor
Jul 16, 2016

Official File retention policy for OneDrive for Business and SharePoint

Does anyone have information on the length of time files in OneDrive for Business and SharePoint online are retained after an end user deletes them ?   Is there a way of placing unlimited retention...
files
Storage
Salvatore Marco Biscari's avatar
Salvatore Marco Biscari
Brass Contributor
Items are removed from the recycle bin(s) after 90 days, starting from the original delete date, independently from the recycle bin in which they are (first or second level). Notice that the items do not automatically move from the first level recycle bin to the second level recycle bin. The second level bin is rather an "administrative" bin which is used to recovery items that users have mistakenly deleted from the first level bin. Give a look to this: https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Manage-the-Recycle-Bin-of-a-SharePoint-Online-site-collection-5fa924ee-16d7-487b-9a0a-021b9062d14b?ui=en-US&rs=en-US&ad=US
escupham's avatar
escupham
Steel Contributor
Aug 09, 2016

I've heard that when a person leaves the company, you can set up OneDrive so it would automatically notify the persons Manager (based on the org chart) and they have 30 days until to get content before it's officially purged.  I can't find documenation on this, do you know where that is or can verify if that's true?

    • Robert Allen's avatar
      Robert Allen
      Copper Contributor
      Aug 10, 2016

      Thanks for this , that is what I was looking for.

  • Prakash Acharya's avatar
    Prakash Acharya
    Copper Contributor
    Dec 01, 2017

    In case of user account that owns an OneDrive is deleted from Azure Active Directory:

    • Ownership of OneDrive will be transferred to the Manager (if the Manager property in Azure AD is available). If not, secondary owner (created by default during provisioning) will have full access to that OneDrive.
    • If the Manager Field is populated for the deleted account, the manager will receive an email message that states that the site will be removed after the retention period expires, and that access to the site is granted to the manager.
    • If the Manager field isn't populated for the user account and a secondary owner was configured in Setup My Sites under the User Profile section of the SharePoint admin center, the secondary owner contact will receive an email message that states that the site will be removed after the retention period expires, and that access to the site is granted to the user.
    • Seven days before the retention period expires, a second email message will be sent to the manager or secondary owner that states that the site will be deleted in seven days.
    • The default retention period is 30 days but this value can be modified by using the -OrphanedPersonalSitesRetentionPeriodparameter for the Set-SPOTenant cmdlet in the SharePoint Online Management Shell.
    • User profile should never be deleted manually from SharePoint admin center. If removed manually before OneDrive is removed, it will result an orphan OneDrive.
    • If the OneDrive site is put on hold as part of an eDiscovery case, the site won't be deleted by using this process until the hold is removed. Although an email message is sent as part of the site deletion process the site will remain on hold until the hold is removed.
    • The retention period for cleanup of OneDrive begins when a user account is deleted from Azure Active Directory. No other action will cause the cleanup process to occur including disablement of a user account or removal of a user’s license.

    Keywords: OneDrive, User Profile, User Account

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