In Asset Bank it is possible to archive your assets, meaning that only administrators (or Groups with specific permissions) will be able to access them. There are a couple of different ways of achieving this, depending on which is more suitable for your configuration. 

Archiving your assets using "attribute exclusions"

By default, there is an attribute called "Active Status" with options for 'Inactive', 'Active', and 'Expired'. When an asset is tagged as 'Inactive' or 'Expired' it will be hidden from users of the system, unless they are part of a Group that has permission to see archived assets.

Whilst this example is using the "Active Status" attribute, it is possible to set up the same configuration using a different attribute of your choosing.

If you want an asset to expire (or become 'archived') at a particular date, you can set a date in the 'Expiry Date' attribute. On this date, the "Active Status" will be set automatically to 'Expired'. This configuration is based on Attribute Rules, so it is possible to create additional rules, such as e-mailing administrators when the asset is expired.

Using this approach means that, for users with permission to see archived assets, assets with a different status may be displayed in the same folder without indicating the archived status to the user. If this is an issue, it may be worth considering changing the Display Attributes so this information is visible while browsing, or use Filters so it is possible for these users to hide archived assets. 

Archiving your assets using an "archive" Folder

Note: In previous versions, 'Folders' were called 'Access Levels'

The alternative option is to move archived assets into a different folder, which means you can have greater flexibility over the permissions (i.e. users can 'view' but not 'download' archived assets). In this case, you would simply need to create a new "Archive" folder and then configure the folder permissions for each of your Groups so only the relevant users have access to these assets.

Using a Bulk Update you can easily 'replace' the existing folders with the newly created "Archive" folder, which will restrict the permissions based on the Group configuration mentioned above.

Archive offline and delete from Asset Bank

If the assets need to be archived offline and removed from Asset Bank, then you need to either Download or Export the assets from your system - depending on whether you always want to retain the metadata as a spreadsheet.

Exporting assets from the system means you will be able to obtain the assets as well as a spreadsheet that contains the metadata for these files.

The process for this is explained in this article, except you would need to run the initial search for the assets you want to archive, rather than a search for all assets in the system. You may also use a lightbox to hold the assets as you can then export the assets from your lightbox.