Can you sell SharePoint and OneDrive files to AI companies?
Sometimes, for the documents a company authored and can clean. SharePoint and OneDrive hold much of what Microsoft 365 companies write: policies, proposals, reports and working drafts. The value is in the version history, and Microsoft says admins can limit how many versions are kept. A plain download usually gives only the current file, so whether the drafts still exist is the first question.
What SharePoint and OneDrive hold
| Document libraries | Shared files for a site or team, from policies to project folders, with the library settings that apply to them. |
| OneDrive folders | Each person's working files. They are personal until moved, and files from Teams chats end up here too. |
| Major and minor versions | Saved states of a document. A draft-to-final path across versions shows how a document gets written. |
| Lists | Structured records such as registers, trackers and request logs. |
| Audit events for versioning | Microsoft logs changes to version limits and deletions of versions, which tells you whether history was trimmed. |
How data leaves SharePoint and OneDrive, route by route
| Tool | What an export gives you | What is missing or needs an admin |
|---|---|---|
| Download or sync by a user | Files a person can open, as ordinary documents. | Current versions only in most cases, one library or folder at a time, and only what that person has permission to see. |
| Purview eDiscovery or Content search export | Documents exported as native Office files. The older flow had an Include versions for SharePoint files option, and document created and modified dates were kept. | The page we read applies to the older experience, retired for most tenants in August 2025. It also notes folders and document sets are skipped and files can be renamed if they sat in a preservation hold library. |
| Microsoft Graph | A list of versions for a drive item, newest first, for a file in OneDrive or a SharePoint site. | Microsoft notes that OneDrive does not preserve complete metadata for previous versions, and old versions may be kept for a limited time set by admin settings. |
Tool names belong to their owners and are used only to say where records usually live. Export features change by plan and version, so check the current rules for your account.
Who sets the version limit, and why it matters
Microsoft says global and SharePoint admins set default version limits for new libraries, and site owners can override them for their site or library. Settings can be automatic, or manual with a count of major versions and an optional expiry period.
When versions pass the limit they are marked for permanent deletion and bypass the recycle bin. Items under a retention policy or an eDiscovery hold are the exception: the library limit is ignored for them. So a company with a retention policy may have a deeper history than its library settings suggest.
What to ask your admin
Ask for three facts before anything else: what the organization-level version setting is, whether any site has a different one, and whether versions were ever bulk deleted. Microsoft logs those actions, so the answer is on record.
Then ask which libraries hold finished work and who owns each one. A library owned by a former employee or by a client portal needs ownership checked first.
Counting
Count documents per library, by file type, with the number that have more than one version. A thousand documents with a single version are a set of final files; a thousand with twenty versions each are a set of drafting histories, and they are described differently.
Do not count OneDrive personal folders as company assets until you have confirmed what they contain; an employee may keep private files there.
What stays out of a SharePoint or OneDrive set
| Personal OneDrive folders | Mixed with private files, so they stay out unless a person has reviewed theirs. |
| Documents with client or employee names in them | Replaced with codes, or the document stays out. |
| Content under retention or hold | Not used until counsel confirms what the hold allows. |
| Permission and sharing data | Lists of who can open what reveal staff and clients, so they are not part of any set. |
More on this: how personal details are removed, who carries the risk and how you get paid.
An example, invented for illustration
An architecture practice keeps proposals and design reports in SharePoint libraries. The SharePoint admin confirms that the organization default keeps a high number of major versions and that no site has trimmed history. An eDiscovery export of four libraries includes versions. The practice removes client names from the files, leaves out anything sitting in a personal OneDrive, and the owner reads a sample of drafts before deciding.
Questions owners ask about this
Does a normal download include previous versions?
In most cases no. A download or sync gives the current file. Versions come through version history in the library, an eDiscovery export option, or the Graph versions endpoint.
Who can change how many versions SharePoint keeps?
Global and SharePoint admins set organization defaults, and site owners can override them for sites and libraries they own, according to Microsoft.
Are deleted versions recoverable?
A version a user deletes goes to the site recycle bin. A version removed because it passed a limit, or by a trim job, is permanently deleted and bypasses the recycle bin.
Can I find out whether history was trimmed?
Microsoft says audit events record changes to version limits and bulk deletion of versions in the Purview portal, so an admin can look.
Didn't find your question? Ask us directly.
Sources
The vendor's own pages this guide draws on. Some help centers did not open for us, and where a step rests on a summary and not the page itself, the guide says so. Menus and limits change by plan and version, so check the current pages for your account.
Keep reading
Related kinds of records
- SOPs and knowledge bases: Procedures with their edit history and comments; published help articles add nothing.
- Client deliverables and drafts: Each draft beside its final version with the comments that changed it, kept only where the client agrees.
- Outlook and Microsoft 365 email export: How company email and Teams chat leave Microsoft 365, and what retention and privacy settle first.
- Google Drive export: How to keep the comments and the version history when documents leave Google Drive.
- Microsoft Teams data export: Mailbox storage, Purview eDiscovery and the Graph export APIs for Teams chats and channels, with the deletion windows.