ObjectScale Object Lock protects object versions from accidental or malicious deletion such as a ransomware attack. It provides this protection by allowing object versions to enter a Write Once Read Many (WORM) states, where access is restricted based on attributes set on the object version.
Object Lock provides the following methods for managing retention:
- Retention period—Specifies a fixed period of time during which an object version remains locked. During this period, your object version is WORM-protected and cannot be overwritten or deleted.
- Legal hold—Provides the same protection as a retention period, but it has no expiration date. Instead, a legal hold remains in place until you explicitly remove it. Legal holds are independent from retention periods.
A retention period has two modes:
- Governance mode—Users cannot overwrite or delete an object version or alter its lock settings unless they have special permissions. With governance mode, you protect objects against being deleted by most users, but you can still grant some users permission to alter the retention settings or delete the object if necessary. You can also use governance mode to test retention-period settings before creating a compliance-mode retention period.
- Compliance mode—A protected object version cannot be overwritten or deleted by any user, including the root user in your account. When an object is locked in compliance mode, its retention mode cannot be changed, and its retention period cannot be shortened. Compliance mode helps ensure that an object version cannot be overwritten or deleted during the retention period.
In standard S3 protocol, Object lock is only for versioning enabled buckets. Starting from ObjectScale 1.3 version extends the standard S3 protocol to permit Object lock at the bucket level with versioning turned off. The extensions support the standard S3 object locking on versioned buckets and adds support for Object lock on non-versioned buckets.
When Object lock is enabled with versioning, the behavior is the standard S3 protocol behavior. When Object lock is enabled without versioning, the object lock functionality operates on the bucket rather than versions of the bucket similar to ECS retention and traditional file locking.
Consider the following recommendations:
- Once a bucket has versioning turned on, it can never be disabled.
- Be careful when using compliance retention because it cannot be decreased or removed.
- Keep in mind that only locked object versions are protected from deletion; If a newer or current version of an object is not locked, it can be deleted.
- Compliance mode is stricter than governance mode. Locks cannot be removed, decreased, or downgraded to governance mode.
- Governance mode is less strict than compliance mode. Governance mode can be removed, bypassed, or elevated to compliance mode.