Excluding chats from Team backup

[dan.kennedy]

We have a client who has asked if we are able to prevent public/private chat from being backed up within a team site.
They still want the rest of the data within that Team to be backed up, just not the chat part.

I don't think that's possible but just wanted to double check?

[Polina]

Hi Dan,

The backend for Teams conversations is Exchange Online: сhannel chats' messages are stored within group mailboxes, and 1:1 personal chats - in users' mailboxes.
To protect Teams data with VBO, you need to select the corresponding O365 group and specify its processing options, which include group mail/site and group members' data. By unchecking "mail" options, you will completely exclude conversations from backup.

[dan.kennedy]

Hi Polina, thanks for the reply.

If we exclude the "mail" option from the O365 group will that not exclude all the mail items sent to the group as well as the conversations?
The customer wants to only exclude the chats, they still want to retain the email - which I don't think will be possible?

[Polina]

That's right, all mail items will be excluded. Selecting Teams chats only is not yet possible.