What does Google Vault do?
Think of Google Vault as a digital safe for storing and organizing important business stuff. But instead of storing money or jewelry, it stores emails, files, chat messages, and other documents from your computer that you use with Google tools, such as Gmail or Google Drive.
How does Google Vault work?
- Save things in case you need them later: If you need to find an old email or document, even if someone deleted it, Vault can help you find it.
- Complies with legal rules: If your business has to keep certain documents for years (e.g., for taxes or audits), Vault does it automatically.
- Search easily: If you have to find a specific document or message, you can search for it as if you were using a super Google for your files.
- Control information: You can decide what things are saved, who can see them and for how long.
How does it help me?
- Avoid legal or administrative problems: If someone asks you for proof of a contract or message (for example, in a dispute), you will have it available even if someone has deleted it by mistake.
- Information security: Ensures that nothing important is lost, even by accident.
- Peace of mind: If your business relies heavily on emails and files, Vault gives you peace of mind that everything is protected.
Do I need it?
It depends on your situation:
- You need it if:
- Your business handles sensitive or confidential information.
- You are in a sector with many legal rules, such as finance, health or technology.
- You have a team and you want to make sure you don’t lose key information.
- You don’t need it if:
- You have a very small business and do not handle important documents or mail.
- You prefer to manually save and organize your files.
Is it worth the price?
Vault is included with some Google Workspace plans (such as Business Plus or Enterprise). If you already use these plans, great! You pay nothing extra.
If you have to pay separately, it is worth it if your business could lose a lot of money or time by not finding an important document. If this is not your case, maybe you don’t need it for now.
In short: Google Vault is like insurance for your emails and documents. Is it mandatory? No, but if you handle important information or work in an industry with a lot of rules, it can be a useful investment.
Let me get this straight, so I understand that it’s like a backup system but in the cloud?
Sort of! Although Google Vault has something in common with backups, it is not exactly the same. I’ll explain with a simple example:
Similarities with backups:
- Saves important information such as emails, files and Google messages.
- You can recover things even if someone deleted them intentionally or by mistake.
Important differences:
- Do not create a copy of everything, everything, everything:
- Vault does not keep a separate copy of all your data. Rather, it “locks” the original data so that it is not lost and you can search for it at any time.
- If you or your team delete a file, Vault may retain it if you have set up retention policies.
- It is designed for audits and legal searches:
- Vault doesn’t just store data; it also helps you search and filter for specific things. For example: “Find all emails from Peter between January and March with the word ‘invoice’.”
- It is useful if you need to comply with laws or prove something in a legal process.
- Does not work for restoring full accounts:
- If you lose access to an entire account (for example, someone leaves the company and their account is deleted), Vault does not work as a backup to recover everything.
So, is it a cloud backup system?
Not exactly. It’s more like a “super advanced filing cabinet” to comply with legal rules and protect you from losing key information.
If you are looking for something specifically for full backups (such as all your data, settings and files), you would need a dedicated cloud backup tool, such as Google Backup and Sync (discontinued as of 2021) or specialized services such as Backupify.
Vault complements a backup system, but does not replace it. 😊
