PowerProtect Data Manager 19.15 Administrator Guide

Retention locking

Retention locking prevents the deletion or alteration of data on a protection storage system for a user-defined period of up to 70 years. PowerProtect Data Manager supports both governance mode and compliance mode retention locking for backups and replicas.

The PowerProtect DD documentation provides more information about each retention lock mode, including the differences between modes. Retention locking requires enablement and licensing on the protection storage system before use with PowerProtect Data Manager.

Retention locking is a two-stage process:

1. Create a storage unit on which you set the appropriate retention lock mode. Setting the retention lock mode enables but does not activate retention locking.
2. Configure primary backup objectives that both target this storage unit and activate retention locking. Toggling on the retention lock setting for a primary backup objective activates retention locking in accordance with the configured retention lock mode of the selected storage unit.

For more information about configuring a primary backup objective, see the appropriate publication.

When you set the retention lock mode on a storage unit, you can never disable or change it. To use a different retention lock mode with a primary backup, target a different storage unit. The original retention lock mode persists for existing backups or replicas that were created before the change.

The choice of retention lock mode can impact which protection policies and primary backup objectives share a storage unit. Consider the retention lock settings when you design your storage unit architecture.