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How to enable Block Download Policy in Office 365

Drew Berry 20 Reputation points
2023-05-01T20:53:39.13+00:00

Question: How do I enable the Block Download Policy in Office 365 (or enable from SharePoint Admin Center?)

Tenant: Office 365 GCC High

Permissions used: Global Admin

Reference: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/block-download-from-sites

Attached image: What "license" is needed to execute this command?

The reference site does not mention Office 365, only Microsoft 365, which makes me think the "Block Download Policy" is a feature only available in commercial Microsoft. If true, is there another way to block downloads specifically on SharePoint sites?

Powershell_SPOService_License_Error

Microsoft 365 and Office | SharePoint | For business | Windows
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  1. Emily Du-MSFT 51,881 Reputation points Microsoft External Staff
    2023-05-02T07:09:59.4766667+00:00

    Block download policy for SharePoint sites and OneDrive is one of SharePoint Advanced Management features.

    So, in addition to the license you currently have, this feature requires a Microsoft Syntex - SharePoint Advanced Management license.

    As a workaround, conditional access policy also can block download for all SharePoint site collections.

    Note: Due to GCC High environment, cannot apply conditional access policy for one site collection.

    Require one of following licenses:

    • Microsoft Syntex - SharePoint Advanced Management
    • Microsoft 365 E5/A5/G5
    • Microsoft 365 E5/A5/G5/F5 Compliance
    • Microsoft 365 E5/F5 Information Protection and Governance
    • Office 365 E5/A5/G5

    Steps:

    1.Go to Azure Active Directory admin center -> Protect&secure -> Conditional Access -> New policy.

    2.In the Users section:

    User's image

    3.In the Cloud apps and sections:

    User's image

    4.In the Session section:

    User's image

    5.Enable policy.

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  1. Jason Sherry 0 Reputation points
    2025-08-27T17:05:46.94+00:00

    When you enable this support, blocking downloads, it also prevents moving the file to another SharePoint site.

    While this makes logical sense, since a user could move the file to another site that doesn't block downloads and downloads it from it, this article should mention that it also blocks moving files to another site. Moves are also blocked by Power Automate and Quick Steps, tried these also.

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