Microsoft 365 has become the backbone of how modern businesses operate. Email lives in Exchange Online. Documents live in SharePoint and OneDrive. Team collaboration happens in Microsoft Teams. For most organizations, losing access to this data wouldn't just be inconvenient — it would be catastrophic.
So it's natural to assume Microsoft has it covered. They're one of the largest technology companies in the world. They run massive, redundant data centers. Surely they're backing up your data, right?
Not exactly.
Microsoft operates under what's called a shared responsibility model. In simple terms, Microsoft is responsible for keeping the platform running — the infrastructure, the availability, the security of their data centers. You are responsible for your data — protecting it, retaining it, and recovering it when something goes wrong.
This isn't buried in fine print. Section 6b of the Microsoft Services Agreement states it plainly: "We recommend that you regularly backup Your Content and Data that you store on the Services or store using Third-Party Apps and Services."
Microsoft guarantees that you can log in. They don't guarantee your data will be there when you do.
Understanding where Microsoft's native protection falls short helps clarify why a dedicated backup solution matters.
When someone deletes a file or email, it goes to the recycle bin. That's your safety net — but it's a short one. Deleted items are permanently purged after 93 days. If nobody notices the deletion within that window, the data is gone forever. And in practice, people often don't notice. A folder gets accidentally deleted during a cleanup. A departing employee's files get removed. A sync error wipes out a directory. By the time someone needs that data, it's often too late.
When an employee leaves and their account is disabled, a countdown starts. After 30 days, their OneDrive is deleted. All of it — every file, every folder, every document they created over their tenure. If that employee was working on client projects, managing vendor relationships, or building institutional knowledge in their personal files, that information vanishes. IT teams are often surprised to learn this. They assume disabled accounts are preserved indefinitely. They're not.
Microsoft 365 has versioning, which helps with ransomware recovery — you can roll back to previous versions of files. But sophisticated attackers know this. They can exhaust version history by making rapid changes, effectively overwriting your recovery options. And if ransomware encrypts files faster than versioning can keep up, you're left with encrypted versions all the way down. Native tools aren't designed for disaster recovery. They're designed for convenience.
Many industries have retention requirements that extend far beyond what Microsoft provides natively. SEC regulations require broker-dealers to retain communications for at least three years. HIPAA requires certain records to be kept for six years. Legal matters can require preservation of data for the duration of litigation, which can span years. Microsoft's retention policies can help with some of this, but they're complex to configure, require specific licensing (often E5), and aren't true backup — they don't provide an independent copy of your data that exists outside Microsoft's infrastructure.
True backup isn't just keeping data longer. It's creating an independent copy of your data that exists separately from your production environment. If something catastrophic happens — ransomware, accidental mass deletion, a misconfigured retention policy, or even a major Microsoft outage — you have a separate copy you can restore from.
The 3-2-1 rule has been a data protection standard for decades: keep three copies of your data, on two different types of media, with one copy stored offsite. Cloud-only configurations that rely entirely on Microsoft's infrastructure violate this principle. If your production data and your "backup" are both in Microsoft's cloud, you don't really have backup — you have replication. And replication doesn't protect you from the scenarios that actually cause data loss.
Sidechain Data Vault is a comprehensive backup and recovery service for Microsoft 365, built by data security specialists and operated from private infrastructure we own.
We're not an IT shop that bolted on backup as an afterthought. We're the team that manages encryption and key management solutions for financial institutions — and we've applied that same security-first mindset to cloud data protection.
Sidechain Data Vault protects your entire Microsoft 365 environment. Exchange Online mailboxes, including all emails, calendars, contacts, and tasks. SharePoint Online sites, document libraries, and lists. OneDrive for Business files and folders. Microsoft Teams channels, conversations, and shared files. Everything is backed up daily, with incremental captures that minimize backup windows while maintaining complete recovery options.
Unlike SaaS backup providers that store your data in shared public cloud infrastructure, Sidechain Data Vault stores your backups in private data centers we own and operate. This provides true separation between your production environment and your backup — satisfying the offsite requirement of the 3-2-1 rule and ensuring that an incident affecting Microsoft's infrastructure doesn't also affect your ability to recover.
We operate geographically separated facilities in Las Vegas and Dallas. Premium and Enterprise tier customers benefit from geo-redundant storage, with data replicated between both locations for disaster resilience.
All backup data is encrypted in transit using TLS 1.2 and at rest using AES-256 — the same encryption standard used by financial institutions and government agencies. But we go further than most backup providers.
Our Enterprise tier offers an industry-first capability: Hold Your Own Key (HYOK) encryption. With HYOK, your organization retains control of the encryption keys used to protect your backup data. The keys are stored in a Thales CipherTrust key manager under your control. When data is encrypted or decrypted, our systems request the key from your key manager in real time. We never store or cache your keys.
This means we physically cannot access your backup data without your involvement — even if compelled by legal process. For organizations with strict data sovereignty requirements, regulated industries, or simply a security-first mindset, HYOK provides a level of control that no other Microsoft 365 backup provider offers.
Recovery flexibility matters as much as backup coverage. Sidechain Data Vault provides granular recovery options across all protected workloads. Need to restore a single email from six months ago? Done. Need to recover an entire SharePoint site to its state before a ransomware incident? Done. Need to restore a departed employee's OneDrive to a different user? Done.
Every backup creates a recovery point, and you can restore from any point within your retention period. Data can be restored to its original location, to an alternate location within your tenant, to a different Microsoft 365 tenant entirely, or exported locally in standard formats like PST for Exchange data.
Backup is worthless if you can't restore. Too many organizations discover their backups are corrupted, misconfigured, or incomplete only when they need to recover from an actual incident — the worst possible time to find out.
Sidechain Data Vault includes scheduled restore testing to validate that your backups are actually recoverable. Standard and Premium tiers include quarterly restore testing. Enterprise tier includes monthly testing. Each test validates backup integrity, successful restore operations, and data accuracy. You receive documentation of each test, providing proof that your backup actually works — before you need it.
Sidechain Data Vault is available in three tiers, designed to match different organizational requirements and budgets.
At five dollars per user per month, Standard tier provides essential protection for organizations that need reliable backup without advanced features. You get daily automated backups of your complete Microsoft 365 environment, one year of retention, storage in our Las Vegas facility, best-effort recovery support during business hours, and quarterly restore testing. For many small and mid-sized organizations, Standard tier provides exactly the protection they need at a predictable cost.
At ten dollars per user per month, Premium tier adds geo-redundancy and faster recovery. Your backup data is replicated between our Las Vegas and Dallas facilities, providing resilience against regional disasters. Retention extends to three years, meeting the requirements of most regulatory frameworks. Recovery SLA improves to four-hour response during business hours, with priority support queue access. Restore testing remains quarterly. Premium is our most popular tier, offering the right balance of protection, compliance support, and value for most organizations.
At fourteen dollars per user per month, Enterprise tier delivers the highest level of protection and control. You get everything in Premium, plus unlimited retention for long-term compliance requirements, one-hour recovery SLA with 24/7/365 support, monthly restore testing for continuous validation, compliance reporting packages for audit support, a dedicated support contact who knows your environment, and — most importantly — Hold Your Own Key encryption.
Enterprise tier is designed for organizations in regulated industries, organizations with strict data sovereignty requirements, and security-conscious organizations that want the highest level of control over their backup data.
Sidechain Data Vault is built for organizations that take data protection seriously.
RIAs, wealth managers, broker-dealers, banks, and insurance companies face stringent regulatory requirements around data retention and protection. SEC and FINRA rules mandate specific retention periods for communications. Auditors expect documentation of backup procedures and proof of recoverability. Sidechain Data Vault provides the extended retention, compliance reporting, and customer-controlled encryption that financial services organizations require.
Healthcare organizations are the number one target for ransomware, and HIPAA imposes strict requirements on the protection of patient data. Sidechain Data Vault provides HIPAA-compliant infrastructure, Business Associate Agreements, and the ransomware resilience that comes from having backup data stored on completely separate infrastructure from your production environment. When attackers encrypt your Microsoft 365 data, you can restore from a backup they never touched.
Law firms hold some of the most sensitive data imaginable — client communications, case files, deal documents, and privileged information. Losing this data isn't just operationally damaging; it's a malpractice risk and a breach of client trust. Sidechain Data Vault provides the long-term retention needed for case files that may be relevant years after a matter closes, the granular recovery needed to respond to discovery requests, and the encryption controls needed to assure clients that their information is protected.
You don't have to be in a regulated industry to need backup. If your organization relies on Microsoft 365 for daily operations — and most do — then losing that data would hurt. Accidental deletion, ransomware, employee mistakes, sync errors, and malicious insiders don't discriminate by industry. Every organization that uses Microsoft 365 should have a backup strategy. The only question is whether you implement one before or after you need it.
Implementing Sidechain Data Vault is straightforward. There's no hardware to deploy, no software to install, and no disruption to your users.
The process begins with a brief consultation where we review your environment, understand your compliance requirements, and discuss your recovery objectives. Based on that conversation, we recommend the appropriate service tier.
Onboarding requires minimal involvement from your team. A Global Administrator authorizes our Microsoft Entra ID application through a standard consent flow — a process that takes about five minutes. We handle all technical configuration, set up your backup policies, and initiate the initial full backup.
Most organizations are fully operational within 48 hours. Once the initial backup completes, daily incremental backups begin automatically. You'll receive monthly health reports showing backup status, storage consumption, and any issues. When you need to restore something, contact our support team and we'll handle it according to your service tier's SLA.
Within two days, your Microsoft 365 data is protected by enterprise-grade backup infrastructure, managed by data security specialists, stored on private infrastructure we own, and verified through regular restore testing.
Microsoft 365 is a powerful platform, but it operates under a shared responsibility model that leaves data protection to you. Native retention policies, recycle bins, and versioning provide some safety net, but they're not backup. They don't provide an independent copy of your data. They don't protect against the scenarios that actually cause catastrophic data loss. And they don't provide the recovery flexibility, compliance support, and security controls that serious organizations require.
Sidechain Data Vault closes that gap. Complete coverage for your entire Microsoft 365 environment. Private infrastructure that we own and operate. Encryption expertise from a team that builds security solutions for financial institutions. Granular recovery options that let you restore exactly what you need. Verified recoverability through scheduled restore testing. And, for Enterprise customers, the industry's first customer-controlled encryption for Microsoft 365 backup.
Your data is too important to leave to assumptions. Let's talk about protecting it.
