Recover Groups

After you protect the Groups in your domain, you can recover whole Groups from Cohesity Cloud Protection Service to:

  • The same Microsoft 365 Group.

  • A different Microsoft 365 Group in the same Microsoft 365 domain.

  • A new Microsoft 365 Group in the same Microsoft 365 domain.

Points to note:

  • If you're restoring a Group that does not exist in the Microsoft 365 domain, Cohesity creates a new Group with the metadata and data from the backup snapshot.

  • If you restore to an existing Group, the group resources in the existing Microsoft 365 Group are overwritten or appended with the restored data. The following table details the group resources that are overwritten or appended:

    Restore Behavior Group Resource Type
    Appended members
    owners
    mails (data)
    Overwritten hideFromAddressLists
    hideFromOutlookClients
    displayName visibility
    securityEnabled
    description
    theme

Recover a Group

Before proceeding for recovery, you must review the considerations.

To recover protected Microsoft 365 Group:

  1. In Cloud Protection Service, go to Sources to set up your recovery task.

  2. Click on the Source name and select the Group tab.

  3. Above the tree, select Show All > Protected.

  4. Find the Group you need and click the Recover button on that row to open the New Recovery form with the Latest snapshot (protection run).

  5. In the New Recovery form, if you need to add more Groups and/or recover from an earlier backup, click the Edit icon in the top right of the form.

    1. To add Groups, enter a Search term on the left, locate the other Groups, and select them.

    2. To use a different Recovery Point for a Group, click the Edit icon on the tile for that Group. Find the recovery point you need and click Select Recovery Point.

  6. Click Next: Recover Options to return to the form.

  7. Under Recover To, select Original Location or New Location.

    If you choose New Location, specify the Group Name and the Group SMTP.

  8. Select your Recovery Options:

    1. Continue on Error. Enable to recover even if errors occur when recovering Groups. For example, if one of the Groups cannot be recovered, Cohesity will still attempt to recover the other selected Groups.

    2. Restore Metadata: Toggle to restore the standard metadata for the selected object.

      The following metadata fields are restored with data.

      • Created By (author)

      • Modified By (editor)

      • Created Date

      • Modified Date

        During cross-domain restore operations, the Created By (author) and Modified By (editor) fields are not restored because the corresponding users from the source domain will be unavailable in the target domain.
        The Created By metadata is not restored if the user referenced in the Created By field is deleted. The Modified By and Created By metadata are not restored if the user referenced in the Modified By field is deleted.

    3. Task Name. Change the default name of the recovery task.

  9. Click Recover.

Recover Groups Items

Before you can recover a Group’s items, you need to set up Microsoft 365 Groups protection with Indexing enabled.

You can recover the following Group items:

  • Group Mailbox items, such as Group emails, mailbox folders, and calendar items.

  • Group Site items, such as, document libraries.

Recover Group’s Mailbox Items

To recover a Group’s Mailbox items:

  1. In Cloud Protection Service, go to Sources to set up your recovery task.

  2. Click on the Source name and select the Group tab.

  3. Above the tree, select Show All > Protected.

  4. Find the Group you need and click the Recover Groups Items button on that row to open the New Recovery form.

  5. On the New Recovery Microsoft 365 - Groups page, in the Recovery Type, select Search Group’s Mailbox Items.

  6. From the Item Type drop-down, do the following:

    • Select Emails & Folders and use the global search to find the emails and folders that needs to be restored.

    • Select Calendars and use the global search to find the calendar item that needs to be restored.

    Click Next: Recover Options to return to the form.

  7. Under Recover To, select Original Location or New Location.

    • If you choose New Location, select a Registered Source and the Target MS Group.

    • Click Download as PST to export the backed-up email(s), mailbox folder(s), or calendar items as a PST file. To enhance security, enable Password Protection under Recovery Options and set a password for the exported PST file.

      A new recovery task is created to download the PST file. When the task is completed, from the Activity page, click the task name and then click Download Files to download the generated zip file.

  8. Select your Recovery Options:

    • Continue on Error. Enable to recover even if errors occur when recovering Groups. For example, if one of the Groups cannot be recovered, Cohesity will still attempt to recover the other selected Groups.

    • Restore Metadata: Toggle to restore the standard metadata for the selected object.

      The following metadata fields are restored with SharePoint data.

      • Created By (author)

      • Modified By (editor)

      • Created Date

      • Modified Date

        During cross-domain restore operations, the Created By (author) and Modified By (editor) fields are not restored because the corresponding users from the source domain will be unavailable in the target domain.
        The Created By metadata is not restored if the user referenced in the Created By field is deleted. The Modified By and Created By metadata are not restored if the user referenced in the Modified By field is deleted.

    • Task Name. Change the default name of the recovery task.

    • Password Protection. Enable to add a password for the exported PST file.

  9. Click Recover.

 

Next > Protect your Microsoft 365 Mailboxes, OneDrives, SharePoint Online Sites, and Teams so you can recover them easily when you need to, as well!