Delete Specific Email From Exchange 2013 For Entire Organization

In this article you will learn the technique to delete specific email from Exchange 2013 for entire Organization. While working with Exchange Server, several users may encounter situations where they need to delete emails from entire organization of Exchange. Some of them are virus attacks, confidential email sent accidentally that requires removal, need for removing emails from all mailboxes with particular subject, etc. In the blog, we will be learning about a technique for deleting specific email from Entire organization in Exchange Server.

How to Delete Specific Email from Exchange 2013/2010?

Before user can start the procedure, he needs access rights or permissions that are he should be member of Discovery Management Role as well as member of mailbox Import Export. By default, administrator is not the member of these roles.

Steps involved in deleting specific email from Exchange 2013 for entire Organization are as follows-

1. Add user as the member of Discovery Management in Exchange Server
   Discovery Management role group is one of the built-in role groups that make up the role based access control (RBAC) rights model in Exchange server. Members of Discovery Management role group are allowed to perform searches of mailbox in Exchange organization for any data meeting specified criteria.
   Hence, user needs to be a member of Discovery management and username should be replaced with the username that has to be given access. For adding these roles to the user, the following ways can be used:
   • Exchange Management ShellWe will use the following command to add any user who needs to be given access to search and delete the specific mail from the organization: 
     
   • Graphical User Interface While using GUI, following steps needs to be considered:
     * Launch Exchange Management Console, Go to Client Access under Server Configuration.
     
      * Click on Properties of ECP (Default web site) under Exchange Control Panel section and copy the internal URL given under General Tab.
     
     * Go to browser and paste the URL of ECP (Exchange Control Panel).
     * Login with the help of correct admin credentials.
     
     * Go to Mail -> Roles and Auditing option and double-click on Discovery Management.
     
     
     * Now Click on + (Add) sign to add administrator as a member of Discovery Management role group and save it.
     
     
     
     
2. Add user in Mailbox Import Export Role
   For this, we will use the following command and execute them on Exchange Management Shell:
   
   
   Here, the administrator is assigned role for mailbox import and export.
3. Search the desired email
   • Before deleting the emails in bulk, LogOnly switch can be used to verify how many mails are going to be deleted and to ensure the deletion of only the right ones. The below command will be used to check the same: 
     
   • Running this command will show how many mailboxes contain the same content. After that, a mail will be created to inbox of administrator with number of items as shown below: 
     
4. Delete the specific email Use the command given below to delete the email:
   
   
   The above command will search for all the mails having virus as subject and delete them from the Exchange Organization.
   
5. Verify the removal of the mail by checking at the inbox of the mailbox, where the mail was available before removing it.

Like this you will be able to delete specific email from Exchange 2013 for entire Organization.

Conclusion

Many situations that require users or administrators of Exchange environment delete the mails entirely from the organization has been discussed. The article has also defined ways that can be helpful in those cases when you want to delete specific email from Exchange 2013 for entire organization. Any user working in Exchange environment can get help of this content for deleting mails, if needed. If the steps used in the above procedure are difficult to understand, user can optionally go for automated script for the same task.