Is "Vault" required for an Admin to search Email, Chat and Drive history?

[DavidT]

Hi – just want to check if access to Vault (with it setup correctly), is the only way it's possible for a Google Admin to access email, google chat and google drive history and contents of other users on the same domain?

My company has a Business Standard subscription, so we don't have Vault... Curious to know if there is any other way in Google Admin console, without using a third-party service.

Thanks.

[jayhlee]

What's your use case? Vault is an archiving and eDiscovery tool. It allows admins to preserve Workspace data according to organization policies regardless of actions performed by end users.

If you just want to see what's currently in a user's mailbox then you can use Gmail API and domain-wide delegation. This is what free tools like git.io/gyb use to backup user data.

[DavidT]

@jayhlee – we were asked by the company head to run some searches on another user's mailbox and chat history (audit/compliance reason). We need to see the content for those messages.

Currently, in Google Admin, we can run the audit reports but it only shows activity stamps with no detail as far as the content of emails and chats.

I'm aware I could simply reset the user's password and login the mailbox, locating whatever email exists still there. But, I don't like that approach...

I understand that in Google Vault, you can open a "Matter" and (by default) the data is all preserved and searchable. So, I'm thinking to upgrade to the Plus plan that enables archiving and eDiscovery (i.e. Vault), to more easily handle cases like this in future.

The free tool looks great, but I want to keep the setup as concentrated within Google Admin as possible (and where possible).

[jayhlee · Accepted solution]

What you are describing is exactly what Vault is meant to do. I'd suggest telling the company head to meet their request you need to upgrade Workspace to a Vault-eligible SKU (this is almost certainly not a one off ask).

Whatever you do right now, without Vault having been in place the user mailbox is not immutable, the user could easily have cleaned up the relevant emails.

[DavidT]

Thanks @jayhlee. Makes sense. We overlooked the requirement for this (glaringly obvious) feature unfortunately. Upgrading now...