You are the Microsoft 365 administrator for a company. The company runs SharePoint Server and Exchange Server in an on-premises datacenter. The site collection for the finance department is currently encrypted using third party software. You need to move as many services to Microsoft 365 as possible. What should you do?

The primary objective is to move as many services as possible to Microsoft 365. The existence of third-party encryption on the on-premises SharePoint site is a consideration for the migration plan, not a permanent blocker. The standard procedure would be to decrypt the data, migrate it to SharePoint Online, and then leverage Microsoft 365's robust, native encryption features for data at rest and in transit. This approach fulfills the company's goal of maximizing cloud service adoption and utilizes the integrated, compliant security model provided by Microsoft 365.

B. Leaving finance department SharePoint data on-premises fails to meet the goal of moving as many services as possible and unnecessarily complicates the IT environment with a hybrid setup.
C. This option is illogical. The encryption is specified for SharePoint data, not Exchange mailboxes, so there is no technical reason to leave finance mailboxes on-premises.
D. This option is the least effective, as it keeps both SharePoint and Exchange on-premises for the finance department, directly contradicting the stated goal of the migration.

1. Microsoft Learn. (2024). Data Encryption in OneDrive and SharePoint. Microsoft Docs.

Reference: In the "Encryption at rest" section

it states

"In SharePoint and OneDrive

data is encrypted at rest at two levels: disk encryption with BitLocker and per-file encryption of content." This confirms that SharePoint Online has robust native encryption

making the on-premises solution redundant post-migration.

2. Microsoft Learn. (2023). Plan for SharePoint and OneDrive in Microsoft 365. Microsoft Docs.

Reference: The "Step 2: Determine your content migration strategy" section outlines planning for data migration. It implies that existing data states (like encryption) are part of the planning phase to prepare content for a move into the cloud platform's native environment

not to prevent the move.

3. Microsoft Learn. (2024). Security and compliance in SharePoint. Microsoft Docs.

Reference: The "Information protection" section details the comprehensive security features available in SharePoint Online

including data loss prevention (DLP)

sensitivity labels

and encryption. Migrating allows the company to take advantage of this integrated and centrally managed security framework.