How to Restore Deleted Microsoft 365 Sites and Mailboxes

Introduction

Has your valuable Microsoft 365 business data been completely decimated, either due to ransomware, malicious deletion, or a technical failure?   The instructions below will help you restore an entire Exchange mailbox, SharePoint or OneDrive site, or set of Teams/Groups if they have been deleted from Microsoft.

Teams

Each of the deleted teams needs to be restored one at a time. If you need to restore a large number of teams, you can open a CloudAlly Support ticket to help with the restore process.

To restore a deleted Team:

1. First Step: Restore a Public Channel

1. • Click the Recovery element from the Navigation Panel. The Restore & Download page is displayed with all your active-backup account details.
   • Click the Microsoft Groups/Teams backup task from which you wish to recover the data. The Restore or download Microsoft Groups & Teams page is displayed.
   • Locate the Team (not the Group – that will come later) that you would like, to restore. Click the arrow under the Action column to navigate to the Restore or Download
   • Enter the appropriate date immediately before the Teams data was deleted, or simply click Continue without filling in the date fields to view all backups.
   • Locate the most recent Channel backup prior to the ransomware attack and select it. Scroll down to the bottom of the page, click Restore, and then OK.

• Check the Jobs page to determine when the restore is complete.
• Click the Homepage element from the Navigation Panel, and then click on the Teams backup task to return to the Teams backup Click the CloudAlly refresh icon on the top-right of the screen in order to display the newly restored Team. You will need this in the following steps.

2. Second Step: Restore the Teams Sub-Services

Perform the following steps for each of these Teams sub-services in this order:

1. Sites
2. Calendars
3. Conversations
4. Metadata – this will finalize the restore, by recovering the Members, Owners, and most importantly, the Team Name.

For each sub-service perform the following steps:

1. Click the Recovery element from the Navigation Panel, and then click the Microsoft Teams backup task from which you wish to recover the data.
2. Locate the most recent Team backup prior to the loss of your data. Click the arrow under the Action column to navigate to the Restore or Download
3. Locate the most recent Site, Calendar, Conversation, or Metadata (in that order) and select it. Scroll down to the bottom of the page and click
4. Click the Restore To field and select the (Restored) channel.
5. For Sites, select the “Replace: Restore will overwrite existing live data” option. 
6. Click OK to complete the restore
7. Repeat these steps for the remaining sub-services.

Groups

Groups are created by Microsoft when the Teams are created. When you restored the Channel, both the Team and the Group were created at the same time. Before you begin, verify that the Group was indeed created in Microsoft.

Perform the following steps for each of these Group sub-services in this order:

1. Sites
2. Calendars
3. Conversations
4. Metadata – this will finalize the restore, by recovering the Members, Owners, and most importantly, the Group Name.

For each sub-service perform the following steps:

1. Click the Recovery element from the Navigation Panel, and then click the Microsoft Groups backup task from which you wish to recover the data.
2. Locate the most recent Group backup prior to the loss of your data. Click the arrow under the Action column to navigate to the Restore or Download
3. Locate the most recent Site, Calendar, Conversation, or Metadata (in that order) and select it. Scroll down to the bottom of the page and click
4. Click the Restore To field, a select the (Restored) channel.
5. For Sites, select the “Replace: Restore will overwrite existing live data” option. 
6. Click OK to complete the restore
7. Repeat these steps for remaining sub-services.

MS Exchange

To restore a MS Exchange mailbox that has been deleted:

1. The Admin needs to recreate all users in the Active Directory that have been deleted.
2. The Admin needs to recreate their mailboxes. Alternatively, the Admin could restore to an existing user, but needs to ensure that the users have a license with a mailbox.
3. From the Homepage, locate the MS Exchange backup task you would like to restore, and then click the Recovery icon on the right.
4. Select one of the active mailboxes on the list, and click Next.
5. In the Full Mailbox Recovery box, click Restore, and then Next. 
6. Choose the backup you want to restore.

• First option: restore the Last Backup.
• Second option: click Specific Backup Date and select a backup date immediately prior to when the mailbox was deleted.

7. Select which sub-services to restore, or accept the default of restoring all services (recommended).
8. Choose where to restore your backup to:

• The default is to restore to the original account.
• Alternatively, you could restore to a different account, provided it is within the same domain. Click that option, and select an account from the drop-down list.

9. Review the information on the confirmation screen. If the information is correct, click Next and then Restore to begin the recovery task. (If the information is not correct, click Cancel.)
10. Check the Jobs page to track the progress of your job. After the restore task completes, you will receive a Confirmation Report by email.
11. The restored data will be in a newly created “(Restored)” folder. After the recovery, move the recovered data back into the appropriate mailbox folders. 

SharePoint

To restore SharePoint Site Collections:

1. Recreate all of the deleted site Collections in Microsoft SharePoint.
2. Click Recovery from the Navigation Panel and then click on the SharePoint backup task.
3. Locate the Site Collection that you want to restore and then click the icon to the right of the site. The Restore or download page is displayed.
4. Select the Via Snapshot radio button
5. Enter the date range that you would like to select from, or just click Continue for a full list of backups.
6. Select the backup you want to recover – the one closest to the date that all of your SharePoint data was deleted.
   • Scroll down to the bottom of the page, and click Restore.
   • From the pop-up dialog, click Replace: Restore will overwrite existing live data and then click OK.
   • Click Yes to the question about overwriting live data.

You will receive an email notification when the restore is complete and can view the job status from the Jobs page.

OneDrive

There is no need to re-create the OneDrive site, it just needs to be re-enabled from Microsoft. During the recovery process, use the OneDrive URL.

To restore OneDrive sites:

1. Click Recovery from the Navigation Panel and then click on the OneDrive backup task.
2. Locate the Site that you want to restore and then click the icon to the right of the site. The Restore or download page is displayed.
3. Select the Via Snapshot radio button
4. Enter the date range that you would like to select from, or just click Continue for a full list of backups.
5. Select the backup you want to recover – the one closest to the date that all of your OneDrive data was deleted.
   • Scroll down to the bottom of the page, and click Restore.
   • From the pop-up dialog, click Replace: Restore will overwrite existing live data and then click OK.
   • Click Yes to the question about overwriting live data.

You will receive an email notification when the restore is complete and can view the job status from the Jobs page.