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The cloud is someone elses computer. Act accordingly. It's a shame this person lost their work. More and more stories like this need to come to light and we ne

The cloud is someone elses computer. Act accordingly. It's a shame this person lost their work. More and more stories like this need to come to light and we need to convince others the cloud is a risk, not a solution.

EricE 4y ago
One of the killer features of a QNAP NAS is the built in cloud backup utilities for Google and Microsoft - it always amazes me how often I have to fight with people to turn them on. You'd think after the original Photobucket meltdown people would be more cognizant of stuff like this, but here we (still) are :(
- vorpalhex 4y ago
  You can roll this yourself with rclone, for the DIY folks.
jfoster 4y ago
It was a solution. Google Drive was great until they turned user/customer hostile. Arguably, no one could really have seen this coming, because this doesn't even seem to make business sense. Google are seemingly acting against the reputation of their own services.
- vorpalhex 4y ago
  Google (and their ilk) are risk adverse. Is it legal to keep a list of electoral candidates and their public info? Yes. Could it be disinformation? It could. Would that be harmful to Google to have Google Sheets be used to distribute? Yes. Does the risk of it being bad outweigh the benefit of keeping legal content? Yes, strongly, and it *always* will. It is always in Google's interest to be as risk adverse as possible. They always will be. (This applies to all clouds too)
  - jfoster 4y ago
    > Would that be harmful to Google to have Google Sheets be used to distribute? Yes. If it's a private file (not shared), the question doesn't even make sense. Some degree of control might make sense for 100% publicly shared content on Google Drive, but how does it make any sense that they are cutting off access for the owner of the content?
    - vorpalhex 4y ago
      Why risk it, if you're Google?
      - jfoster 4y ago
        Because part of being big & successful if you're Google involves operating a business. If your approach to everything is "why risk it?" then you eventually just choose to shut everything down.
        vorpalhex 4y ago
        I mean that is literally what Google has been doing.
- vinyl7 4y ago
  > Arguably, no one could really have seen this coming Maybe 15 years ago when all this was new....but it's been pretty obvious that this was the course of things over the last 6-7 years. It makes business sense when there is no competition.
- allturtles 4y ago
  It does make business sense. Drive is facing serious abuse problems. See for example this article [0] for the other side of this coin. Google is trying to come up with automated solutions for shutting down 'abusive' items. The OP is an example of the automated solutions not working that well. [0]: https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/07/google-is-finally-doing-something-about-google-drive-spam/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/07/google-is-finally-do...
  - jfoster 4y ago
    You are conflating spam from 3rd parties with having a private file that Google thinks they need to block you from accessing. It is 100% possible (and not even difficult) for Google to prevent me from receiving spam from other Google Drive users whilst also allowing me to access my own Google Drive files.
    - allturtles 4y ago
      I suspect OP has not really lost access to their own files. Per the blog post about this system [0], "When it’s restricted, you may see a flag next to the filename, you won’t be able to share it, and your file will no longer be publicly accessible, even to people who have the link." My guess is OP has multiple accounts, created this file on account A, and can no longer access the file while logged in as account B, so it seems to be "removed from Drive." But I could be wrong, in which case I agree with you, this doesn't make sense as an anti-spam measure. https://workspaceupdates.googleblog.com/2021/12/abuse-notification-emails-google-drive.html https://workspaceupdates.googleblog.com/2021/12/abuse-notifi...
golem14 4y ago
I don't believe the OP has lost the work - looks like sharing has been disabled. It's still pretty sucky.
- jfoster 4y ago
  Doesn't sound like it... 1. The author of the thread refers to the file having been removed: https://twitter.com/mkramer/status/1547257266465914882 https://twitter.com/mkramer/status/1547257266465914882 2. The author of the thread says they're storing csv files on their hard drive in future: https://twitter.com/mkramer/status/1547262861105397760 https://twitter.com/mkramer/status/1547262861105397760
domador 4y ago
Part of the response is for users to trust the cloud less, but I wish part of the response would be to increasingly hold cloud storage companies accountable such that in the future they can't get away with this kind of abuse without severe consequences for them.

EricE 4y ago

One of the killer features of a QNAP NAS is the built in cloud backup utilities for Google and Microsoft - it always amazes me how often I have to fight with people to turn them on. You'd think after the original Photobucket meltdown people would be more cognizant of stuff like this, but here we (still) are :(

vorpalhex 4y ago
You can roll this yourself with rclone, for the DIY folks.

jfoster 4y ago

It was a solution. Google Drive was great until they turned user/customer hostile. Arguably, no one could really have seen this coming, because this doesn't even seem to make business sense. Google are seemingly acting against the reputation of their own services.

vorpalhex 4y ago
Google (and their ilk) are risk adverse. Is it legal to keep a list of electoral candidates and their public info? Yes. Could it be disinformation? It could. Would that be harmful to Google to have Google Sheets be used to distribute? Yes. Does the risk of it being bad outweigh the benefit of keeping legal content? Yes, strongly, and it *always* will. It is always in Google's interest to be as risk adverse as possible. They always will be. (This applies to all clouds too)
- jfoster 4y ago
  > Would that be harmful to Google to have Google Sheets be used to distribute? Yes. If it's a private file (not shared), the question doesn't even make sense. Some degree of control might make sense for 100% publicly shared content on Google Drive, but how does it make any sense that they are cutting off access for the owner of the content?
  - vorpalhex 4y ago
    Why risk it, if you're Google?
    - jfoster 4y ago
      Because part of being big & successful if you're Google involves operating a business. If your approach to everything is "why risk it?" then you eventually just choose to shut everything down.
      - vorpalhex 4y ago
        I mean that is literally what Google has been doing.
vinyl7 4y ago
> Arguably, no one could really have seen this coming Maybe 15 years ago when all this was new....but it's been pretty obvious that this was the course of things over the last 6-7 years. It makes business sense when there is no competition.
allturtles 4y ago
It does make business sense. Drive is facing serious abuse problems. See for example this article [0] for the other side of this coin. Google is trying to come up with automated solutions for shutting down 'abusive' items. The OP is an example of the automated solutions not working that well. [0]: https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/07/google-is-finally-doing-something-about-google-drive-spam/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2021/07/google-is-finally-do...
- jfoster 4y ago
  You are conflating spam from 3rd parties with having a private file that Google thinks they need to block you from accessing. It is 100% possible (and not even difficult) for Google to prevent me from receiving spam from other Google Drive users whilst also allowing me to access my own Google Drive files.
  - allturtles 4y ago
    I suspect OP has not really lost access to their own files. Per the blog post about this system [0], "When it’s restricted, you may see a flag next to the filename, you won’t be able to share it, and your file will no longer be publicly accessible, even to people who have the link." My guess is OP has multiple accounts, created this file on account A, and can no longer access the file while logged in as account B, so it seems to be "removed from Drive." But I could be wrong, in which case I agree with you, this doesn't make sense as an anti-spam measure. https://workspaceupdates.googleblog.com/2021/12/abuse-notification-emails-google-drive.html https://workspaceupdates.googleblog.com/2021/12/abuse-notifi...

golem14 4y ago

I don't believe the OP has lost the work - looks like sharing has been disabled. It's still pretty sucky.

jfoster 4y ago
Doesn't sound like it... 1. The author of the thread refers to the file having been removed: https://twitter.com/mkramer/status/1547257266465914882 https://twitter.com/mkramer/status/1547257266465914882 2. The author of the thread says they're storing csv files on their hard drive in future: https://twitter.com/mkramer/status/1547262861105397760 https://twitter.com/mkramer/status/1547262861105397760

domador 4y ago

Part of the response is for users to trust the cloud less, but I wish part of the response would be to increasingly hold cloud storage companies accountable such that in the future they can't get away with this kind of abuse without severe consequences for them.