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It is completely reasonable for a layman to believe that his files are protected by a password, and therefore that nobody can access those files without the pas
by tomstuart 15y ago
It is completely reasonable for a layman to believe that his files are protected by a password, and therefore that nobody can access those files without the password. You don't have to be an idiot to have that mental model, especially when Dropbox reinforce it with explicit statements like "Dropbox employees aren't able to access user files".
It's a consumer service, and consumers don't know or care how encryption works. They just need to be told the consequences of whatever technical decisions have been made on their behalf, so it's important for Dropbox to be honest in explaining them.
- fluidcruft 15y agoIt's also completely reasonable for laymen to assume that the government can gain access to their Dropbox files. I don't recall Dropbox ever claiming anywhere that they would be technologically incapable of complying with a subpoena.
- kragen 15y agoWhen they said, "Dropbox employees aren't able to access user files", they were saying they were incapable of complying with a subpoena.
- fluidcruft 15y agoPerhaps. I don't think it's appropriate to edit out the context of that statement. What was actually said was "Dropbox employees aren’t able to access user files, and when troubleshooting an account they only have access to file metadata (filenames, file sizes, etc., not the file contents)". I don't think that statement as a whole necessarily responds to their capabilities to answer a subpoena. I don't think the lay public would conflate the two contexts.
- qq66 15y agoIt's reasonable for a layman to assume that Google can't read his Gmail? That Facebook can't see your private messages? We need to have higher expectations of "laymen."