M365 Changelog: Microsoft Information Governance: update to retention and label policies for Microsoft 365 Groups

MC250342 – Compliance administrators will soon be able to create and update existing retention policies and label policies so that they affect either a Microsoft 365 group mailbox or the associated SharePoint site.

When this will happen

Rollout begins in mid-April and should be complete by the end of May.

How this will affect your organization

Today any policy scoped to one or all Microsoft 365 groups applies to both the associated group mailbox and SharePoint site.

With this update, you’ll be able to use PowerShell to update a policy to apply it to either the mailbox or connected SharePoint site. You do not need to edit an existing policy if you want it to continue to apply both the group mailbox and the SharePoint site.

The default behavior will continue to be that any Microsoft 365 group policy will apply to both the group mailbox and the connected SharePoint site, unless specifically stated otherwise.

What you need to do to prepare

This new capability must be configured via PowerShell cmdlets. This update will not affect any existing retention or label policies.

If you wish to leverage this ability to scope a policy to only the site or the mailbox of the Microsoft 365 group, please use the new “Applications” parameter when creating or updating a policy:

• To create a new policy: New-RetentionCompliancePolicy.
• To update an existing policy: Set-RetentionCompliancePolicy documentation.