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Author

Lee Pender

Senior Content Marketing Manager

Lee was a journalist in the technology industry for 15 years, writing for and managing publications that served both IT and partner audiences. His experience as a corporate content creator includes tenures with an MSP and a provider of tax-compliance services. He writes about a variety of topics for Acronis, including cybersecurity trends, MSP management, emerging technologies and product updates.

The volume of
data created and stored in Microsoft 365 is exploding. That is good news for
productivity, but not such great news for professionals responsible for data
retention.

More files
created means more data to retain. In regulated industries, data retention is
required under threat of fines and penalties. Even in lightly regulated or unregulated
industries, data retention is critical for maintaining customer confidence and
business continuity. Organizations must also account for regulations such as GDPR,
which applies to any organization that processes data related to the European
Union’s
approximately 450 million citizens.  

The bottom
line is this: Without a strong Microsoft 365 backup strategy, organizations of
all kinds risk losing control over their data and exposing themselves to
regulatory and operational risk.

Microsoft 365
just keeps growing. Microsoft Teams alone now has more than 320 million daily
active users, a 23% increase year over year, according to SaaS Ultra. Those users
send more than one billion files every month.

AI is
amplifying the explosion of file volume. According to SQ Magazine, 70% of professionals say Microsoft Copilot helps them
complete tasks faster, directly contributing to increased content creation. Microsoft
also reports that users add more than three billion files to Microsoft 365 every day.

Copilot does
more than help users generate content. It indexes emails, documents, chats and
files across Microsoft 365, making that data searchable and usable in
AI-generated responses. That creates a highly dynamic and interconnected data
environment.

As data
volumes grow, so do the risks associated with managing it. One key concern is
that AI systems like Copilot may still reference data that users believe has
been deleted. If that data remains within retention policies or indexed
systems, it can still influence AI outputs. The unexpected impact of “deleted”
data can create potential issues with accuracy, privacy and compliance.

At the same
time, Microsoft operates under a shared responsibility model. While it ensures
service availability, it does not provide comprehensive Microsoft 365 backup or
take responsibility for long-term data retention and recovery.

That clearly
stated policy leaves organizations exposed to data loss from accidental
deletion, insider threats and cyberattacks. As environments scale, those risks
become more frequent and more difficult to manage without dedicated protection.
As a result, organizations must back up their own data and ensure it remains
available. Microsoft does not provide that protection on their behalf.

To keep pace
with AI-driven growth, organizations must treat backup and retention as core
components of their Microsoft 365 strategy.

A dedicated Microsoft 365 backup solution ensures that your organization can
quickly and completely recover data across Exchange Online, SharePoint,
OneDrive and Teams. That capability is essential when users delete files,
accounts are compromised or ransomware impacts cloud environments.

Microsoft 365 email archiving also plays a critical role in
preserving business communications. Email remains a system of record for
contracts, approvals and regulatory documentation. Archiving supports long-term
retention, simplifies eDiscovery and ensures organizations can respond to audits
or legal requests with confidence.

The need for
strong backup and retention becomes even more urgent in regulated sectors. For
instance, in finance, organizations must retain communications and transaction
records for years. As data volumes grow and AI tools surface insights from
across systems, the risk of incomplete or inconsistent records increases if organizations
don’t properly enforce retention policies.

In health care,
the stakes might be even higher. Organizations must protect sensitive patient
information while keeping data available for audits and care delivery. As AI
systems access large datasets, organizations must ensure that they retain only
accurate and compliant data. In both fields, a robust combination of Microsoft
365 backup and archiving ensures that all required data remains intact and
accessible.

Because
Copilot connects information across the entire Microsoft 365 environment,
previously siloed data becomes part of a broader knowledge base. This increases
the visibility of older or redundant data and raises the risk of surfacing
information that should have been deleted or archived.

Organizations
must now think beyond storage and focus on governance. That includes
understanding what data exists, how long it is retained and how it can be
recovered when needed. Without that level of control, AI can amplify existing
data management gaps.

A modern
approach to Microsoft 365 data protection starts with two essential
capabilities: backup and archiving. Backup ensures that organizations maintain
independent, recoverable copies of their data across Microsoft 365 services.
Archiving ensures that they retain critical communications over the long term,
such that they can be accessed quickly when required.

Organizations
that rely solely on native tools will struggle to meet retention requirements
and recovery expectations. Those that invest in comprehensive Microsoft 365
backup and email archiving will better position themselves to protect their
data, maintain compliance and keep AI-influenced data under control.  

Find out how Acronis helps businesses secure their Microsoft 365 environments.