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How to Set up a Custom Retention Rule for Google Chat Data in Google Vault

Quick and easy-to-follow guide for Google Workspace administrators

Retain Google Chat messages for as long as you need to

  • By following the steps below, you can ensure that you will retain your organization’s chat messages for as long as you need to, regardless of any circumstances.

The priority of custom retention rules

  • Custom retention rules in Google Vault will always override default retention rules because they have higher priority.
  • However, they have lower priority than holds.

How to set up a Google Vault retention rule for Google Chat messages step-by-step with images

Step 1

How To Set Up A Custom Retention Rule For Google Chat Data In Google Vault - Step 1

To create a custom retention rule for Chat data, open Vault at https://vault.google.com and click Retention.

Step 2

How To Set Up A Custom Retention Rule For Google Chat Data In Google Vault - Step 2

Select the CUSTOM RULES tab on top and then click the Create button.

Step 3

How To Set Up A Custom Retention Rule For Google Chat Data In Google Vault - Step 3

Click the drop-down menu under Service and choose Chat. Click CONTINUE.

Step 4

How To Set Up A Custom Retention Rule For Google Chat Data In Google Vault - Step 4

Next, select the Scope of your retention rule. You can apply it to data in All Chat spaces or users in specific Organizational units.

If you select the Organizational units option, data in Chat spaces will get excluded from this rule.

Step 5

How To Set Up A Custom Retention Rule For Google Chat Data In Google Vault - Step 5

If you selected the Organizational unit option, your retention rule will apply to all users in the OU you choose, as well as all of its sub-OUs.

When applied to the top-level OU, all other OUs will also have the rule applied to them. That way, you are essentially applying it to all users in your account.

Step 6

How To Set Up A Custom Retention Rule For Google Chat Data In Google Vault - Step 6

After selecting an OU, click CONTINUE.

Step 7

How To Set Up A Custom Retention Rule For Google Chat Data In Google Vault - Step 7

Choose how long to retain Google Chat messages

On the Duration and action screen, choose how long to keep data matched by your retention rule.

You can keep it Indefinitely, which means that you will store data in Vault as long as you have Vault and the users matched by the rule have a Vault license assigned. Note that if you delete a user, this also deletes their data from Vault. Make sure to search and export user data before deleting users, as shown here.

If you select the Retention period option, you must now select a number of Days, and then you must also choose the Action after the expiration of the number of days you specify.

The retention period starts when messages are sent or received.

Purge only permanently deleted messages means that you will lose all messages that users have removed from their Trash folder in Gmail after the retention period passes.

Purge messages from Gmail mailboxes and permanently deleted messages. This rule doesn’t affect drafts. After the retention period passes, it will purge all emails (excluding drafts) from users’ Gmail and Vault.

Click CREATE.

Step 8

How To Set Up A Custom Retention Rule For Google Chat Data In Google Vault - Step 8

A brief description of the rule appears. 

Check the boxes to confirm that you understand that holds still apply and have a higher priority than this custom retention rule.

Also, depending on how you configured it, the rule may directly purge messages from users’ accounts without the ability to restore them.

Click ACCEPT to create the custom retention rule.

Step 9

How To Set Up A Custom Retention Rule For Google Chat Data In Google Vault - Step 9

The custom retention rule now appears under the CUSTOM RULES tab when you select Retention in Google Vault.

To remove it, hover over it and click Delete, which appears on the right.

Step 10

How To Set Up A Custom Retention Rule For Google Chat Data In Google Vault - Step 10

Important: any data retained by this rule will be deleted if not included in another rule or hold.

If you’re ok with making this change, click DELETE.

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