IDENTIFYING DATABASE CONTAINERS THAT REFERENCE SPECIFIED DATA ITEMS

Systems, methods, and computer-readable storage media are disclosed for a computer system determining database containers that include references to one or more specified data items. The computer system may determine, from a plurality of containers in a database, a candidate set of containers, where the database includes a plurality of data items that includes the one or more data items. The computer system, for each of the containers in the candidate set, queries the database to determine whether the container includes a reference to any of the specified one or more data items. The computer system uses results of the querying to determine any containers in the candidate set of containers that include such references. These results may be used, for example, to set storage retention policies.