Thanks for that helpful answer Neemobeer .
I think you're confusing 2 different things . A user's personal backup , which is of course his responsibility , and the server/cloud/whatever backup , which is the provider's responsibility , and I find it very hard to believe they don't have these for at least a month back , if not more .
If gmail , etc. has a technical problem , surely they have their backups .
Should the problem be the user's , so he is responsible .
Should it be the provider ( here MS ) ( and my understanding is that this is in fact the case here ) , then they are responsible .