Veeam Backup for Microsoft 365 • Re: Error Backing up SharePoint for unlicensed Users (archived users): 403 (forbidden)

Microsoft’s changes around OneDrive archiving and shared mailbox handling are a direct response to long‑standing behaviour where organisations retained user data indefinitely after staff departures. This created significant storage cost, governance challenges, and in some cases may have conflicted with licensing or usage agreements.

If you read Microsoft’s documentation on Shared Mailboxes and OneDrive handling, it’s clear Microsoft expects organisations to correctly handle data before accounts are decommissioned, de‑licensed, and ultimately deleted. Microsoft have also been openly communicating their plans to restrict access to unlicensed OneDrive data and introduce archiving behaviour (and associated fees) for approximately 18–24 months. This was well signposted and should not be considered an unexpected change.

Re excluding all personal sites, which was suggested by Veeam support: Veeam themselves note in their VB365 best practice and object selection documentation that backing up SharePoint personal sites should be carefully considered.
Veeam documentation reference:
https://bp.veeam.com/vb365/guide/design ... int-online

While OneDrive data resides within the personal SharePoint site, the OneDrive workload backup already protects the user’s data. Backing up the personal SharePoint site protects only the site artefacts, excluding OneDrive data. In many environments, users never customise or change their personal SharePoint site at all. As a result, backing it up adds extra load, noise, and operational complexity for data that often has little to no value

Statistics: Posted by DaStivi — May 07, 2026 11:27 am