Till when a guest account user can still access a file after completely removing him/her guest account

Question

We have shared many files with a guest user account (using his gmail account), using these steps:-

1. Access the document advance permission page
2. Stop permission inheritance

1. "Grant permission" access to the external user account >> with contribute permission

4. The external user get an email to access the file >> for the first time the external user where asked to create a Microsoft account and can access the file
5. now we wanted to remove the user access on all the files on all the site >> so from Office 365 admin >> under Guest >> i removed the guest account >> then i removed from the delete user list using this command:- Remove-AzureADMSDeletedDirectoryObject -Id 7******4
6. but the external user can still access all the files + his username is still mentioned inside the document advanced permission setting.

so till when the guest account can access the files, even that we completely removed him/her guest account?

now for one hour >> the user can directly access the file from the email sent to him >> then after an hour when the user click on the invitation link >> the user will be asked to register again and can access the file. any advice on this scenario?

Thanks

Answer 1

Hi @john john ,

You also need to remove this user from all files and folders with the help of PnP PowerShell:

#Config Variables
$SiteURL = "https://Crescent.sharepoint.com/sites/Marketing"
$ListName="Branding"
$UserAccount = "i:0#.f|membership|steve@Crescent.com"
 
Try {
    #Connect to PnP Online
    Connect-PnPOnline -Url $SiteURL -Interactive
     
    #Get the User
    $User = Get-PnPUser -Identity $UserAccount -ErrorAction Stop
 
    #Get all list items
    $ListItems =  Get-PnPListItem -List $ListName -PageSize 500 -Fields ID
    $ItemCount = $ListItems.Count
 
    #Iterate through each list item
    $Counter=1
    ForEach($ListItem in $ListItems)
    {
        #Display a progress bar
        Write-Progress -PercentComplete ($Counter / $ItemCount * 100) -Activity "Processing Items from List:" -Status "Checking Item '$($ListItem.FieldValues.FileRef)' ($Counter of $ItemCount)"
 
        #Check if the Item has unique permissions
        $HasUniquePermissions = Get-PnPProperty -ClientObject $ListItem -Property "HasUniqueRoleAssignments"
        If($HasUniquePermissions)
        {
            #Get Permissions Assigned to the Item
            $RoleAssignments = Get-PnPProperty -ClientObject $ListItem -Property RoleAssignments
  
            #Remove user from Item permissions - If Found!
            [Bool]$UserFound = $false
            ForEach($RoleAssignment in $RoleAssignments)
            {
                $Member =  Get-PnPProperty -ClientObject $RoleAssignment -Property Member
                If($Member.LoginName -eq $User.LoginName)
                {
                    $UserFound = $True
                    $ListItem.RoleAssignments.GetByPrincipal($User).DeleteObject()
                    Invoke-PnPQuery
                }
            }
            If($UserFound) { Write-host -f Green "Removed user from $($Listitem.FileSystemObjectType) at '$($ListItem.FieldValues.FileRef)' Permissions!" }
        }
        $Counter++
    }
}
Catch {
    write-host -f Red "Error Removing user from List Items:" $_.Exception.Message
}

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Answer 2

Hi @john john ,

Perhaps you can use PowerShell to Bulk Remove SharePoint Online Users from a CSV File.

Here are steps:
Create a CSV file and fill it in according to your requirements, then Format as Table.

UserID needs to be prefixed: i:0#.f|membership|

Use this PowerShell script:

#Variables
$CSVPath  ="C:\UsersToAdd.csv"
 
#Get data from CSV
$CSVData = Import-Csv $CSVPath
 
#Iterate through each row in CSV
ForEach($Row in $CSVData)
{
    Try {
        #Connect to SharePoint Online Site
        Write-host "Connecting to Site: "$Row.SiteURL
        Connect-PnPOnline -Url $Row.SiteURL -Interactive
  
        #Remove user 
        Remove-PnPUser -Identity $Row.UserID -Force
        Write-host -f Green "`tRemoveded User $($Row.UserAccount)"
    }
    Catch {
        write-host -f Red "Error Removing User:" $_.Exception.Message
    }
}

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