S3 Presigned URL 403 on Digital Transcript Bulk Export with Legal Hold Metadata

The Recording API v2 returns a 403 Forbidden when attempting to download the presigned S3 URL for a completed bulk export job containing WhatsApp transcripts with active legal holds.

We are migrating legacy recording archives to a new BYOC S3 bucket in eu-west-2. The bulk export job completes successfully, and the status shows ‘Completed’ in the UI. However, when the downstream legal discovery script attempts to fetch the file using the presigned URL provided in the job response, the request fails with a 403. This only happens when the export filter includes conversations tagged with ‘legal_hold’. Standard voice recordings export without issue. The S3 bucket policy grants full access to the assumed role used by Genesys Cloud for the export, and cross-account trust is verified. The error suggests a permissions mismatch specific to the metadata attached to digital channel transcripts under hold. I have checked the audit trails, and the export job itself logs no errors. Is there a specific IAM policy requirement for digital transcript objects that differ from voice media? The SDK version is 2.3.1, and we are using the /v2/recording/export/jobs endpoint. Any insights into why the presigned URL might be invalid for these specific objects would be appreciated.

The documentation actually says…

Legal hold metadata triggers a secondary encryption layer that the standard presigned URL generator often overlooks. This mismatch causes the immediate 403 response from S3.

Check if your export request includes the specific legalHold flag. If so, use the dedicated download endpoint instead of the generic presigned link.

This bypasses the permission conflict entirely.