Frequently Asked Questions

What is IDrive^® Google Workspace Backup?

IDrive^® Google Workspace Backup is a cloud-to-cloud, SaaS backup and recovery service that offers a comprehensive backup, export, and restore solution for your Google Workspace data. IDrive Google Workspace Backup acts as an additional layer of security against accidental data deletions, cyber-attacks, and ransomware encryptions.

Why do you need to back up your Google Workspace?

According to Google Workspace’s Shared Responsibility Model, Google is responsible only for the bulk of security and service uptime on the platform. The onus of securing the data on the platform against loss falls solely on the user.

Additionally, in-built tools like Google Vault and Google Admin provide only data archival, and partial recovery flexibilities. With no options for backups, versioning, or point-in-time data recoveries, your Workspace data is rendered vulnerable to loss due to human error, malware, or hardware failure. Hence, it is essential to protect your Google Workspace data with a reliable third-party backup and recovery solution.

Which Google Workspace applications are supported by IDrive^® Google Workspace Backup and Restore ?

IDrive^® Google Workspace Backup supports the following online applications:

Google Drive

Users have the ability to

• Backup, search, export, and recover data from My Drive

Note:

• Of Google-specific file formats, IDrive^® Google Workspace Backup currently supports Google docs. Google sheet, Google slides, and Google Drawings.
• Items included in "Shared Drives" are currently not supported for backup.

Gmail

Users have the ability to

• Search data by user or email
• Backup and recover specific data, labels, or individual messages
• Backup and restore an entire label or entire mailbox

Google Contacts

Users can backup, export and restore all contacts or individual contact cards.

Note:

• The external profiles of a contact (Directory profile, Google profile) and contact photos are excluded from backup.
• The Other Contacts folder and the Directory folder are excluded from the backup.

Google Calendar

Users can backup, export, and restore entire Calendars or individual Calendar events.

Note:

• Birthdays, reminders, appointment slots, event conferencing fields, and folders attached to events are excluded from backup.
• The calendar settings Auto-accept invitations and All-day event notifications are excluded from backup.

How does IDrive^® Google Workspace Backup work?

To be able to use IDrive Google Workspace Backup, the Super Administrator of the Google Workspace account needs to authorize IDrive to sync the Google account data for automated backup.

How do I get started with IDrive^® Google Workspace Backup?

To get started,

1. Sign in to your IDrive account.
2. Enter the encryption key set by you during your first login.
3. Click Google Workspace on the LHS menu in the dashboard.
   
4. Click Enable.
   
5. Enter the email of the Super Administrator of the Google Workspace account that you want to backup.
   
6. Enter the private key of the Google Workspace account or import the key as a JSON file.
   
7. Click Create.

Once authorized, you will be redirected to the dashboard of your IDrive Google Workspace Backup account.

Your Google Workspace will be automatically synced with IDrive Google Workspace Backup application for backup and the user data will be displayed on the screen. You can now manage backups, exports and restores for all the users in your Google Workspace account from the web console.

Can I access my backed up Google Workspace data from anywhere?

Yes, you can access your backed up data across Drive, Gmail, Calendar, and Contacts; manage backups; and restore the backed up data from any location via the centralized web-based console.

The web console has the following sections:

• Overview: Get an overview of the user accounts, and backup, exports, and restore summary of all Google Workspace users across Drive, Gmail, Contacts, and Calendar.
  
• Seat Management: Add, view, and manage user accounts across the entire Google Workspace. You can backup individual app data across specific users and view backup summaries, with ease.
  
• Recovery: View, manage and restore point-in-time backups of all users across Drive, Gmail, Contacts, and Calendar. Search, download, restore and monitor specific data from specific users.
  
• Activity Logs: View activity logs of the scheduled system events and user actions like backup, restore, search, and web operations.
  

How does IDrive^® Google Workspace backup secure my data?

IDrive Google Workspace backup secures your data with industry standard 256-bit AES encryption on transfer and storage. Data is stored across top notch data centers, and is encrypted using an encryption set while creating your IDrive account. Know more.

How does IDrive^® Google Workspace Backup run backups?

Once configured with Google Workspace, IDrive Google Workspace Backup runs a full automated backup of your Gmail, Google Drive, Google Contacts, and Google Calendar for all users.

IDrive^® Google Workspace Backup enables automated data synchronization, so that, after the full initial backup, all the subsequent changes are incrementally backed up.

How are the IDrive^® Google Workspace Backups scheduled?

IDrive^® Google Workspace Backup runs three automated backups everyday for all the users of your organization. These system backups run on a predefined schedule for the entire organization.

In the event of a failed backup, the backup is run again immediately till successful.

How do I run a backup for a specific user from my IDrive^® Google Workspace Backup account?

To perform backup for any specific user,

1. Go to the Recovery tab on your IDrive^® Google Workspace backup dashboard.
2. Select the required application from which you want to backup data for the user:
   • Drive - To backup the user’s drive data.
   • Gmail - To backup the user’s mail, contacts, and calendar data.
   • Calendar - To backup the user’s calendar schedules and events.
   • Contacts - To backup the user’s contact cards.
3. Click the user account for which you want to backup data.
4. Select the files or folder that you want to backup by clicking the checkbox against the files/folders.
5. Click Backup now.
   

The backup progress will be displayed in real time. The backup details can be viewed under Backups.

Note: Running a manual backup does not affect the auto-scheduled backups.

How does snapshot and versioning work in IDrive^® Google Workspace backup?

IDrive^® Google Workspace Backup retains previous versions of the backed up data as point-in-time snapshots, enabling you to run point-in-time restores of your data to the exact state it was in at the time of your backup.

The snapshots are retained and consolidated in the following manner:

• IDrive runs automated backups daily 3 times, that are retained for 30 days
• After 30 days, IDrive saves one of the 3 daily backups per user
• After 90 days, IDrive saves one weekly backup per user
• After 365 days, IDrive saves one monthly backup per user

What information can I view from the Overview tab on my dashboard?

The Overview tab gives you a quick glance of your users' and backups. You can view the summary of the following information across Drive, Gmail, Calendar and Contacts.

• Total users: The total number of active users across Workspace.
• Backed up users: The number of active Workspace users currently added to the backup list, and who have completed backup in the last 24 hours.
• Users never backed up: Number of active Workspace users that are not included in the backup list.
• Last backup activity: This displays the last date when every service in the application took a successful backup over a 24 hour period.
• Backup history: Shows the status of the last 10 days, represented by the following icons:
  • - Backup failure
  • - Backups were 100% successful
  • - Backup has not yet commenced
• Backups in progress: Total number of backups presently running.
• Exports in progress:: Total number of exports presently running.
• Restores in progress: The total number of restores presently running.
  

Additionally, you can view a summary of the total data backed up, number of users, and account registration details.

What user management tools can I access under seat management?

You can access records of all the users under the Seat Management tab in your IDrive Google Workspace Backup web console regardless of their backup status.

Navigate to the Users tab under Seat Management to access the following management tools:

• Auto-add: Discovers and automatically syncs all the new users added to your Google Workspace account.
• Activate all users: Activate backup of all unprotected and paused users
• Filter users: Filter records of users according to their backup status- active, paused, unprotected
• Search users: Lookup specific users among the records shown
• Download CSV: Download list of all users in CSV format
• Restore/ Export backed up data: Restore/ export backed up data for users by clicking
• Backup status: Hover over View details to view the summary of backup status, or click the button to view a detailed backup status summary
• Backup actions: Pause, add or remove users from backup set. For details, refer How do I change seat status for users?
  

How do I change seat status for users?

You can add and remove the users from the backup set, or pause user backups by changing their seat status.

To change the seat status for users,

1. Go to the Seat Management tab on your IDrive^® Google Workspace Backup dashboard.
2. Go to the Users tab.
3. Under the Backup actions column corresponding to the user, set the seat status as required.
   
4. Active: Add the user to the active backup set
5. Pause: Pause the backup for the user
6. Unprotect: Remove the user from the IDrive^® Workspace backup set
7. Protect: Resume backup for unprotected/paused users

Note: On changing the seat status to Unprotect for a user, all backups associated with the user will be deleted, and the user will be archived.

How do I add users to the IDrive^® Google Workspace Backup set?

Users in your Google Workspace are automatically detected and added to the backup set once you configure your Google account with IDrive. Enable Auto-add to discover new users joining your Google Workspace.

To enable auto-add,

1. Go to the Seat Management tab on your IDrive^® Google Workspace backup dashboard.
2. Navigate to the Users tab.
3. Enable the toggle switch next to Auto-add.
   

How do I re-add users to the IDrive^® Google Workspace Backup set?

You can re-add paused and unprotected users to the active backup set by changing their seat status to active.

To activate backup for users not included in the backup set,

1. Go to the Seat Management tab on your IDrive^® Google Workspace Backup dashboard.
2. Navigate to the Users tab.
3. Under the Backup actions column next to the paused/archived/unprotected user, select Protect from the dropdown menu.
   
4. To activate all paused/archived/unprotected users, click Activate all users on the top right.
   

How do I view the backup status of the users?

The Backup status next to each user gives you an overview of the user’s backup results for each backup module during the past 24 hours. Click View details to view the following backup status parameters for each module:

• Backup status: Success/failure status of the backup in the past 24 hours, denoted by Completed / Failed
• Storage used: Total space occupied by the backup
• Last backup: Timestamp of the last backup
  

To view the summarized backup status for each module, hover over View details.

How do I restore the backed up Google Workspace data from my IDrive^® Google Workspace Backup account ?

To restore the backed up Google Workspace data,

1. Go to the Recovery tab on your IDrive^® Google Workspace backup dashboard.
2. Select the required application from which you want to restore data.
3. Click the user account from which you want to restore data.
4. Select the appropriate snapshot under Snapshots if you want to perform a point-in-time restore. To restore a specific file or folder, select the item from the list of backed up items. You can also search for a specific file or folder.
5. Click Restore. A popup window will appear.
6. Select Snapshot or Selected Items as required.
   
7. Select the user account from the Restore to drop-down menu to which you want to restore the snapshot or the selected item. You can restore the data to the same user account, or a different user account.
8. Click Restore.

The restore progress will be displayed on the screen in real time.

Are file permissions restored during a restore operation?

Yes, IDrive Google Workspace Backup saves source file permissions, which are reinstated to the restored files during a restore operation.

How do I search and restore a specific file or folder in IDrive Google Workspace Backup?

IDrive Google Workspace Backup enables you to search and recover specific files, entire folders, images, videos, emails, and even contacts and calendars at a granular level.

Can I search for a specific item from my IDrive Google Workspace Backup account during restore?

Yes, you can perform both point-in-time and file-level searches across multiple search parameters to perform a granular restore for a specific item.

To perform a point-in-time search for restoring a specific version of the backed-up data from a user account,

1. Go to the Recovery tab on your IDrive^® Google Workspace backup dashboard.
2. Select the required application from which you want to restore data.
3. Click the user account for which you want to perform the search.
4. To search for all the snapshots for a specific data, select the date on the calendar. A list of all the recent snapshots will be displayed on screen. Select the required snapshot. Click Latest Snapshot to find the last snapshot taken.
   

A file-level search enables you to locate specific backed-up files and folders from a user account.

To perform file-level restore,

1. Go to the Recovery tab on your IDrive^® Google Workspace backup dashboard.
2. Select the required application for which you want to restore data.
3. Click the user account for which you want to perform the search.
4. Go to the Search tab.
5. Enter a valid search term, set the required date and time for snapshots, select single or multiple users from the dropdown menu.

   Note: The snapshot closest to the selected timestamp will be displayed.

6. Click Search.
   

To restore the file(s)/folder(s), refer to this FAQ.

How do I export the backed up Google Workspace data from my IDrive^® Google Workspace Backup account ?

To export the backed up data,

1. Go to the Recovery tab on your IDrive^® Google Workspace backup dashboard.
2. Select the required application for which you want to restore data.
3. Click the user account for which you want to perform the search.
4. Click the user account from which you want to restore data.
5. Select the appropriate snapshot under Snapshots if you want to perform a point-in-time restore. To restore a specific file or folder, select the item from the list of backed up items. You can also search for a specific file or folder.
6. Click Export. A popup window will appear.
7. Select Snapshot or Selected Items as required.
   
8. Click Export.

You can download the generated export files in the Exports tab by clicking next to successful exports. Alternatively, click to delete the export.

Note: Exports will be downloaded as zip files.

Is it possible to restore corrupted files and folders from my IDrive Google Workspace backups?

Yes, you can restore deleted or corrupted files and folders directly to the user account or download them on your device while retaining their exact folder structure.

Where can I view the activity logs for my IDrive^® Google Workspace Backup account?

You can generate the activity log reports of scheduled System Events and initiate User Actions like backup, restore, search, and web operations across IDrive^® Google Workspace backup from the Activity Logs tab.

How can I view the system activity log reports for my IDrive^® Google Workspace Backup?

To view activity log reports for system-generated automatic backups,

1. Go to the Activity Logs tab on your IDrive^® Google Workspace backup dashboard.
2. Click System Events.
3. Select Date range. To set a custom start and end date, select Custom range.
4. Next, specify the following parameters:
   • Event Type: By default, it will be set as Scheduled.
   • Status: Generate log for all events, successes, or failures.
   • Module: Choose the backed up service (All, Gmail, Google Drive, Contacts, Calendar).
   • User: Generate log for specific user(s), or all users.
5. Click View Event Logs.
   

A list of all the scheduled backup activities including timestamp, user name, backed up module, and backup status will be displayed on the screen.

To generate a detailed summary report of the activities, click Generate Summary.

You can also download the activity log reports on your system in CSV format by clicking Download CSV.

How can I view the admin activity log reports for my IDrive^® Google Workspace Backup?

To view activity log reports for admin-initiated actions,

1. Go to the Activity Logs tab on your IDrive^® Google Workspace backup dashboard.
2. Click User Actions.
3. Select Date range. To set a custom start and end date, select Custom range.
4. Next, specify the following parameters:
   • Event Type: Select the type of operation (All, backup, export, restore, other events)
   • Status: Generate log for all events, successes, or failures.
   • Module: Choose the backed up service (All, Gmail, Google Drive, Contacts, Calendar).
   • User: Generate log for specific user(s), or all users.
5. Click View Event Logs.
   

A list of all the user operations including details such as the event type, timestamp, user name, module, and status will be displayed on the screen.

To generate a detailed summary report of the activities, click Generate Summary. You can also download the activity log reports on your system in CSV format by clicking Download CSV.