I'm a new admin at a small company, and I'm tasked with cleaning up old user accounts. We want to keep some data, like emails and OneDrive files, from users who've left. What's the best method to archive this information?
5 Answers
Definitely convert the email to a shared mailbox and give the supervisor access to the OneDrive files. Removing licenses is key, but be careful with the timeline for deletion—some departments are overly cautious about that.
We use Backupify for archiving. It’s not perfect, but it gets the job done. I’m also looking into Keep it, hoping someone can share their experience with that.
For long-term retention, consider converting the user’s email account to a shared mailbox. Then, remove their licenses and rename the account (like adding an 'X' at the start of the username). Access to the email and OneDrive should be limited to the manager for a short period—perhaps a month—just to avoid leaving it out there indefinitely. Just curious if anyone has more efficient methods, though, since it can get cluttered really quick.
RIP all the users with X’s in their names... such a shame.
If you need to keep the data for the long haul, just download everything from their OneDrive to cover all M365 content, convert the email to a shared mailbox, and remove licenses. If you only need short-term access, reset the security info (like the password) for a month, give the manager access, and then delete the account afterward.
Backing up data is a smart move! There are several tools you can use. For instance, we’ve been exporting data from afi.ai, and while we’ve also used rclone.exe for tenant-to-tenant transfers, be aware that it can be throttled by Microsoft. It’s a bit technical, so you need some skills to pull those drive IDs first.
Rclone is handy but does require a bit of understanding. Just a heads up about that!
Don't forget to remove them from the Global Address List (GAL) too!