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If you suspect a SharePoint compromise, open an incident, follow your organization’s approval and incident-command process, and contain the affected identity and sessions while preserving evidence. Then use Microsoft Entra sign-in records and Microsoft Purview audit records to determine what happened, remove the attacker’s access path, and recover only from a known-good state. A password reset or the return of deleted files alone does not establish that the incident is resolved.
1. Open the incident and establish authority
Record when the suspicion arose, the affected user or workload, the indicators that prompted concern, and who owns the response. Follow your organization’s incident command, legal, privacy, and approval processes; notification and evidence-handling obligations depend on your circumstances and jurisdiction.
Before disabling an identity or rotating credentials, check what kind of identity it is and what it supports. A break-glass account, service principal, or sensitive executive account may require a different approval path or coordinated containment to avoid disrupting critical services. Microsoft’s Create a compromised identity incident response SOP template advises responders to “Contain the risk before you complete the full investigation, but apply organization-specific approval logic first.”
2. Contain access and preserve initial evidence
Once authorized, reduce the attacker’s ability to keep using the identity. Actions should fit the identity type and available evidence; coordinate changes that could interrupt business-critical services.
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- Revoke active user sessions and refresh tokens. Reset the user’s password, or rotate the relevant secret for a non-user identity, as appropriate.
- If active risk remains, temporarily disable the user when business approval allows it. Block known malicious IP addresses, devices, applications, or tokens when those controls are available and relevant.
- Preserve incident IDs, alerts, sign-in screenshots or exports, and user statements. Record when each item was captured and retain the original exports where possible.
- Do not treat a password change as proof that access is contained. Investigate other access or persistence routes indicated by the evidence, including sessions, authentication changes, applications, and privileged access.
Keep a contemporaneous record of containment actions, their times, and who approved them. Follow your organization’s legal-hold, privacy, and evidence-handling requirements. Microsoft’s guidance gives examples of evidence and investigation steps, but does not establish a universal chain-of-custody procedure.
3. Establish the identity timeline and likely access path
Review successful Microsoft Entra sign-ins around the suspected start of the incident. Compare the first successful sign-in that appears suspicious with alert times and the user’s account of events. Microsoft recommends assessing details such as time, IP address or location, device, application, MFA result, and recent authentication-method changes.
Look for a timeline that explains how the access began and continued. Phishing, reused passwords, adversary-in-the-middle activity, stolen tokens, and MFA fatigue are possible hypotheses—not findings. Treat one as a cause only when the evidence supports it. Also assess whether the identity could access other Microsoft 365 services, devices, applications, cloud resources, or privileged roles; a SharePoint alert may be only one part of the incident.
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4. Find which SharePoint content was accessed or changed
Search Microsoft Purview audit records for the affected user, the SharePoint Online workload, and the incident timeframe. Examine records for file access, creation, modification, and deletion, then identify affected sites and content. Export relevant results and preserve the search filters and date range so another responder can understand how the scope was determined.
Audit search requires the Audit Logs or View-Only Audit Logs role. The records may include IP and client information, but coverage, availability, retention, and permissions depend on tenant configuration and licensing. Verify what the affected tenant actually retains; do not assume that every customer has identical audit data.
If you suspect a stolen token, Microsoft documents correlating Entra sign-in activity with SharePoint Online audit activity using the Session ID (SID) or Unique Token Identifier (UTI). Search the relevant timeframe and workload, filter for the affected user and identifiers, and compare the resulting events. This can help associate file access or modification with the session under investigation, but it does not by itself prove who operated the session.
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Expand the investigation when the identity’s permissions or the evidence point beyond SharePoint. Include related identities, devices, applications, privileged roles, and other services the account could reach. Keep the scope tied to observed access and plausible access paths rather than assuming that every available resource was affected.
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5. Remove the access path before restoring
Identify and address the cause and any persistence route supported by the evidence. Depending on the incident, that may mean securing credentials, invalidating exposed tokens, reversing unauthorized authentication changes, removing a malicious application, or correcting excessive permissions. Microsoft describes eradication as evicting the adversary and mitigating the vulnerability that enabled re-entry.
Confirm that the known vulnerable paths have been eliminated before treating the environment as ready for restoration. A file restore cannot remove an attacker’s access, and restoring content into an environment with the same exposed access path can leave it vulnerable again.
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6. Choose a recovery route based on what happened
First establish whether the content is in a recycle bin, was hard-deleted, or is present but corrupted or affected by malware. Check the item, site, elapsed time, applicable retention policies, and the confidence you have in the proposed clean state. Preserve evidence before taking cleanup actions; emptying a recycle bin can destroy material needed for recovery or investigation.
| Situation | Potential route | What to verify |
|---|---|---|
| Item remains in its original site’s first-stage Recycle Bin | Restore the item from that bin. | Confirm the item is the affected content and that returning it will not reintroduce malicious or unwanted material. |
| Item has moved to the second-stage (site-collection) Recycle Bin | Restore it from the second-stage bin if it remains there. | Microsoft’s 2026 deletion guidance says an item deleted from its original location remains in the site Recycle Bin for 93 days unless someone removes it from that bin or empties it; it can then reside in the second-stage bin for the remainder of the retention period. Verify the actual item and tenant context. |
| Content was hard-deleted, corrupted, or affected by malware and cannot be recovered through other methods | Ask Microsoft Support promptly about a full site-collection or subsite point-in-time restore. | Microsoft’s 2026 documentation describes an additional 14-day backup period beyond actual deletion for this support-assisted restore route and says it is unavailable after that period. It is not a guaranteed self-service restore; confirm eligibility for the case. |
| Content is still present but altered, or a broader site recovery is being considered | Evaluate the suitable SharePoint recovery mechanism for the item or site, using a known-good state. | Compare the affected scope, recovery point, business impact, and evidence-preservation needs. The appropriate mechanism and availability depend on the incident and tenant. |
Microsoft says that purging an item from the second-stage Recycle Bin permanently removes it. Some API delete operations can also purge content directly instead of routing it through the recycle bins. Do not empty bins during an incident unless that is an intentional, approved part of the response.
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7. Validate recovery and watch for recurrence
After restoration, inspect the affected content and access permissions, then verify that the entry and persistence routes identified during the investigation remain closed. Continue heightened monitoring for suspicious sign-ins, authentication-method changes, unexpected applications or permissions, and renewed file access or changes. The monitoring period and escalation thresholds should follow your organization’s incident plan and the risks found in the case.
Document the impact, evidence reviewed, unresolved uncertainties, containment and recovery actions, and the basis for closing or escalating the incident. If audit coverage is incomplete or the suspected deletion exceeds the documented restore window, record that limitation plainly and consult the appropriate internal teams or Microsoft Support rather than assuming the content is recoverable.
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