Hello,

I work at the Coast Guard HQ in Washington DC as desktop support technician. A user came to me with an issue stating an Archive folder was created in Outlook 2003 that he did not create. I was stumped as to how this could happen. I don't know whether to believe him but I'm wondering is this possible? He swares he did not create the folder and no other technicians had been around to create it.

I take it that you are using Exchange Server?

Yes, this is possible and I have seen it happen soooo many times. The user actually did this without really knowing what they are doing.

To see where this happens, right click on your Inbox and select the tab that says AutoArchive. One of the options is to archive older items to a file. The default file is named Archive.PST and it is saved in your profile. This option is available and selectable on every folder that comes with a new mailbox or is created by the user. If the user creates Rules using the Rules Wizard to organize their email in these folders by subject or user, etc. then they can also control the AutoArchive levels for each of their subfolder containers in their mailbox.

This is done so that you can automatically organize and archive your emails as you see fit. As you can see, users that stumble across these settings without truly understanding what they are will swear that they "did no such thing and that it just appeared all by itself".