Microsoft 365 Security Center is the new home for monitoring and managing security for your Office 365 tenants and all other Microsoft 365 assets. The new security-related platform takes the place previously occupied by the Office 365 Security & Compliance Center. Even though the new security experience offers more options, the old middle is still available, albeit buried a little deeper. Read on to learn what’s new in the Microsoft 365 security center and how to find the legacy Office 365 security and compliance center.
requirements
There are two groups of requirements that you must meet to access the new Microsoft 365 security and compliance center: license and entitlement.
The minimum license required for an organization is a Microsoft 365 E3 subscription.
For a user to access the new centers, they must have at least one of the following roles assigned:
- Global Administrator – Can access both Compliance and Security Centers.
- Compliance admin or compliance data admin – Can access the Microsoft 365 compliance center
- Security Administrator, Security Operator, or Security Reader – are the roles required to access the Microsoft 365 security center.
What’s new in the Microsoft 365 security and compliance center?
The new Microsoft 365 Security and Compliance Center was announced to be generally available on April 22ndnd, 2019. This new platform consists of two separate entities – one dedicated to security, the second – to compliance. Note that new features are added frequently. Measured at this Docs articleThe ultimate goal is to move all functionalities and solutions from the Office 365 Security and Compliance Center to the new platform and to phase out the old platform.
At the moment, many options redirect the user to the old admin center. For example, you won’t find a content search here, and to perform such a search you must go to the legacy Office 365 Security & Compliance Center. Hunting and eDiscovery-related options have also not been migrated yet.
How do I export Office 365 mailbox data in Microsoft 365 Security Center?
Office 365 is a great email platform where security is a top priority. Still, it’s wise to be prepared for the worst-case scenario. Because of this, most security-conscious organizations are looking for a way to back up their mailbox data somewhere else. Local backup copies stored in a safe place allow you to access your data independently of service providers. PST files, despite all their (many) shortcomings, have the advantage of being supported by various email clients.
Leaving aside the irony of using an advanced security-related feature for a backup workaround that uses an outdated and hardly reliable file format (PST).
If you want to access content search directly from the Microsoft 365 admin center, you have two options:
From this point, just follow the steps below How to export Office 365 mailboxes to PST using eDiscovery.
I can’t stress it enough, the method above is a backup workaround, not a good and reliable backup solution. With it, you can recover at least some lost data in case of disaster. However, note that PST files are more suitable for archiving than backup and recovery purposes. And PST file corruption is not just a buzzword – it is a problem that you may face every time you export or access a PST file. It’s worth taking a good look at what this PST workaround might get you into before actually deploying it.
If you are looking for a reliable backup and recovery solution for Office 365 and SharePoint, take a look at CodeTwo Backup for Office 365.
How is a third-party tool better than PST files?
You might be wondering how a third-party backup solution could be any better than plain old PST files, which after all have been in use for ages. Here is a list of the most important advantages:
Granular backup and recovery – You can tell a good backup solution by how it works when you actually need it. In other words, can you browse backup copies efficiently? And what about the recovery? When it comes to PST files, the only way to browse them is to do a PST import in Outlook. This allows you to search a single PST file at a time. On the other hand, with CodeTwo Backup for Office 365 you can search for specific files in the entire backup database and restore individual items or folders to a location of your choice. You can restore items to their original location or to a different mailbox, even if it’s in a different Office 365 tenant.
Incremental backup – The PST export is quite straightforward – by default it performs a 1-1 backup. And while it’s possible to limit exported items by date, this method has the side effect of creating even more PST files to process. CodeTwo Backup for Office 365 has the clear advantage that it creates an incremental backup. You can set up this tool to run periodically to add only the new and changed items to the backup database.
Automation & Reliability – Exporting to PST via Microsoft 365 Security Center is a manual, UI-based task. Since there are no ready-made scripts for exporting the results of a content search, there is no easy way to schedule the task either. The common problem of PST corruption usually occurs when you actually need to recover some items. CodeTwo Backup for Office 365 can be scheduled to run backup processes in cycles, adding only the new and changed items to the backup copies. Why CodeTwo Backup for Office 365 is a safe solution.
For a more detailed description, take a look at the program’s features and its use cases.
