Overview
Has your organization migrated from Microsoft Skype for Business to Teams as the primary collaboration tool?
Are you an admin responsible for managing Microsoft Teams within your organization?
Is your organization concerned about protecting the Teams data and helping its users or teams to restore or recover their data in case of loss due to an error, malicious activities, or accidental deletion?
If your answer is Yes for most of the above questions, then, inSync for Teams is “THE” solution for you. From Teams to Channels-and everything in between – inSync has got you covered.
Before we delve deeper into the inSync data protection solution for Teams, you need to gather some information about the following:
Data backed up by inSync for Teams
Let's take a look at the Teams data that can be backed up using inSync:
Teams
Team Unique ID
Name of the Team
Creation date time and stamp
Permissions assigned to all Team members
Permissions assigned to all guests
Count of Team Members
Count of external guests
Count of Team Channels
All Teams Settings
Teams Site Collection
Site Collection details
Data and metadata parameters for a site collection
Teams content
Now, let’s take a look at the data that inSync backs up in the Team Standard, Private, and Shared channels:
Data in Team Standard channels:Files
OneNote Files - One Note files are backed up as a folder (with the name of the OneNote file) under Files.
Conversations in channel
Channel Email address(Alias) - All the mails sent and received in a channel with all attachments and properties (including user details) provided by the Microsoft APIs.
All messages sent and received with their attachments with other properties (including user details) provided by Microsoft APIs.
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Data in Team Private channels:Conversations in channel
Channel Email address(Alias)- All the mails sent and received in a channel with all attachments and properties (including user details) provided by the Microsoft APIs.
All messages sent and received with their attachments with other properties (including user details) provided by Microsoft APIs.❗ Important
Due to Microsoft API limitations, there is no mapping for Private Channels within Teams and the SharePoint site. Consequently, Files within the Private Channels cannot be backed up and restored in Teams. You can restore Files within the Private Channels from the corresponding associated SharePoint site.
Data in Team Shared channels:Conversations in channel
Channel Email address(Alias)-All the mails sent and received in a channel with all attachments and properties (including user details) provided by the Microsoft APIs.
All messages sent and received with their attachments with other properties (including user details) provided by Microsoft APIs.Files
Default tabs
❗ Important
Insync backs up data from Shared Channels only when the Team hosting those channels is backed up. Shared channels from other teams are not included in the backup.
4. Archived Teams: Backup and download support.
Data excluded from backups for Teams
Exclusion of Teams Meeting Recordings (Configurable)
SharePoint backups will exclude all files from the default folder path of Teams Meeting Recordings (TMR) to ensure optimized backup speed.
For more information, see Exclusion of Teams Meeting Recordings from backups.
Supported Microsoft 365 Editions
inSync supports the following Microsoft 365 editions:
Microsoft 365 For Business
Microsoft 365 Business Basic
Microsoft 365 Business Standard
Microsoft 365 Business Premium
Microsoft 365 For Enterprise
Microsoft 365 E3
Microsoft 365 E5
Microsoft 365 F3
Office 365 For Enterprise
Office 365 E1
Office 365 E3
Office 365 E5
Education
Office 365 A1
Office 365 A3
Office 365 A5
Required roles and permissions for access to Teams
inSync requires the following permissions to access and protect Teams data:
Read and write all groups
Administrator with one of the following roles can configure inSync to protect Microsoft 365 data:
Druva Cloud Administrator
inSync Cloud administrator
Any administrator with role and privileges to manage SaaS Apps
Use cases
As a inSync Cloud administrator,
You can protect your Teams data using a single pane of glass.
You can discover all Teams, channels within the Teams and data within the Teams’ channels and protect them.
Supported inSync tasks for Teams
The following table displays the various tasks that you can perform for Teams using inSync:
Backup | ✅ |
Restore
📝 Note
Due to a Microsoft API limitation, the restore of Conversations data is not supported.
| ✅ |
Download | ✅ |
❌ | |
Legal hold | ❌ |
❌ |
Let’s assume, you are an admin of ABC organization and want to protect Teams A data (Files and Conversations) for the users within your organization.
Wondering what and how to do it?
It's just a few steps post which you can just relax. inSync will keep protecting your data.
Tasks | Details |
Step 1: Set-up inSync to protect Teams | |
Step 2: Set-up a backup frequency to create backup snapshots or restore points with Teams metadata and data within its channel. |
That’s it! Now, inSync takes care of protecting your Teams' data.
Assume that you have inadvertently deleted some important data from Teams A that you have already backed up using inSync. You now have the option to restore or download the deleted data from the backed up snapshots available within inSync. Isn’t it cool?
You can read more about how to restore or download your data at:
The next question that may come to your mind is: How do I monitor backup, restore and download activities/tasks that I have performed using inSync. We have a solution to this too! For more details, see Monitor Teams.
In this article, we touched upon the essence of this feature and sought to give you a glance into how it works. Read on to get more insight and information about protecting your Teams' data.
Unified data protection for Teams and SharePoint
To streamline the backup and restore process, Teams serves as the parent app, while SharePoint is associated with it as its sub-app. This means that, while you back up or restore Teams data, any associated SharePoint sites data including private sites and Shared channel sites are also included.
❗ Important
The backup frequency and retention settings specified for Teams will also be applicable to the associated SharePoint sites.
The configuration settings specified in Teams cannot be modified in SharePoint. If any SharePoint site is not associated with a Team, its settings can be configured from Teams.
Only configured Teams can be enabled and disabled, and consequently, their associated SharePoint sites will also be enabled and disabled.
Configured and non-configured Teams can be deleted however the associated SharePoint sites will be deleted only for the configured Teams. For non-configured Teams, the associated SharePoint sites will not be deleted.
If you enable Data lock for the parent Teams, it will be enabled for the associated SharePoint sites as well.
Backup and retention settings
The backup and retention settings with respect to unified data protection are explained below.
What happens to the existing configuration post-upgrade?
By default, the backup and retention settings specified at the Teams level will automatically apply to the SharePoint sites associated with those Teams.
The current backup and retention settings defined in the Auto-Configuration of the Teams will be applied to the associated SharePoint sites.
Individual Sites with custom backup settings (backup frequency & retention settings) will follow the backup settings of the associated Teams.
Inclusions and Exclusions defined at Teams site backup settings will be retained.
Data Lock settings will be retained.
What is new?
The backup frequency and retention settings specified for Teams will also be applicable to the associated SharePoint sites.
The configuration settings specified in Teams cannot be modified in SharePoint.
Only configured Teams can be enabled and disabled, and consequently, their associated SharePoint sites will also be enabled and disabled.
Configured and non-configured Teams can be deleted however the associated SharePoint sites will be deleted only for the configured Teams. For non-configured Teams, the associated SharePoint sites will not be deleted.
If you enable Data lock for the parent Teams, it will be enabled for the associated SharePoint sites as well.
📝 Note
Enable, Disable, and Delete operations will not be available at the Site level if the parent Team is configured for backup.
What remains unchanged?
There will be no change to the backup configuration for Sharepoint sites if no parent Teams are configured for backup. SharePoint sites can be configured for backup independently and configuration at individual site level is applicable.
There is no change to the app-wise backup monitoring and restore workflows.
Teams and SharePoint behavior in inSync
The following table explains different workflows related to Teams groups and its associated SharePoint sites.
Workflow | Teams | SharePoint |
Discovery | All Teams are discovered | Associated SharePoint sites are discovered |
Configuration | All Teams are configured | Teams configuration will override SharePoint configuration |
Data Lock | The team is data-locked
📝 Note
If a site is configured with data lock enabled and you configure the parent Team with data lock disabled then the site remains data locked.
| Teams settings will be applied |
Schedule, Retention, Include-exclude settings | The team is configured for backup | Teams settings will be applied |
The team is not configured for backup | Teams settings will be applied.
If the Team is not configured, SPO settings will be applied. | |
Enable, disable, delete | The team is marked disabled and deleted | Associated sites will be marked disabled and deleted, respectively |