Amazon S3 Object Lock now supports variable retention with event holds
Amazon S3 Object Lock now supports variable retention, enabling you to apply write-once-read-many (WORM) protection to objects whose required retention period starts with a future event, such as a contract closing or an audit completing. You place an event hold with a retention duration on an object. S3 protects the object while hold is in place. When you release the hold, S3 retains the object for the duration you specified. Unlike legal holds, which end protection immediately upon removal, event holds provide WORM compliance for the required retention period after the triggering event, so you can meet event-based retention requirements without retaining data longer than your policy requires.
You can apply event holds to individual objects, configure them as a bucket default, or apply them at scale with S3 Batch Operations. New IAM and bucket policy condition keys let you control who can set or release holds and enforce minimum or maximum hold durations. Amazon CloudTrail logs all hold operations, and S3 Inventory reports hold status across your buckets.
Event holds for S3 Object Lock is available in the Amazon Web Services China (Beijing) Region, operated by Sinnet, and the Amazon Web Services China (Ningxia) Region, operated by NWCD. To learn more, read the S3 Object Lock documentation.