5 ms·

"I keep all my work on Google/Apple/Dropbox/Office" is really the new version of "I kept all my work on my hard drive and didn't back it up". All of these compa

by paxys 3y ago

"I keep all my work on Google/Apple/Dropbox/Office" is really the new version of "I kept all my work on my hard drive and didn't back it up". All of these companies have shown repeatedly that they will cut off your access with no notice for any or no reason and with no recourse. Cloud backups used to be a smart thing to do. Now they are a liability.

the_other 3y ago
They were always a liability. They were only ever "the smart thing" because they took some hassle away at the point of creating the backup.
- giantg2 3y ago
  They can still be smart for off-site backups in case of local catastrophic issues (like your house burning down). But they are just part of the solution and shouldn't be a single point of failure.
brianwawok 3y ago
All your eggs in 1 basket is never good. Local hard drive + a cloud provider should give you like 99.999999% reliability
- jlkuester7 3y ago
  > Local hard drive + a cloud provider This has been my general strategy for personal data. I have also been trying to figure out if there was a reasonable way to get long-term very-cold storage (e.g. backups of family pictures). Something that would last decades just sitting in a fire-box somewhere (reasonable temps, no moisture). Been considering https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M-DISC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M-DISC, but interested to know if anyone has other ideas...
  - Filligree 3y ago
    Don't quote me on this, but Bluray is apparently supposed to be long-term stable. I haven't explored the claim.
- ryandrake 3y ago
  Key point is that the cloud provider version should not be your "main" version, it should be used for backup only. If it's not on your physical computer that you have direct access to, it's not -your- data anymore.
- Turing_Machine 3y ago
  I actually use three local hard drives in rotation plus a cloud provider to hopefully cover the "building catches on fire and I don't even have time grab a drive" scenario. Maybe a second cloud provider would also be good. I'm going to think about this.
giantg2 3y ago
"Cloud backups used to be a smart thing to do. Now they are a liability." If they're actually a backup they can be a good idea. If it's a single source, then yeah, it's asking for trouble. I even backup my GitHub stuff locally because who knows what could happen.
- lupusreal 3y ago
  Even if the files are actually a backup it's not a good idea if it also gets your email/etc accounts nuked. Megacorps with many online properties are landmine fields because you can get banned from a dozen services for a BS 'violation' on just one of them.
  - giantg2 3y ago
    That idea is true for the rest of those services too. We could just stop using all the services if they are all run by the same Corp and subjected to the same BS rules. If your Google drive got banned for explicit material, it's only a matter of time your Gmail would trigger it because you sent drafts between you and your publisher instead of using Drive. If it's a true backup, it should be encrypted in my opinion, especially on the cloud. Then it doesn't matter since they can't see it.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- paxys 3y ago
  Even if they are just a backup, all these companies scan your data for offensive material and report it to the authorities if their algorithm deems it fit. There have been plenty of cases of parents being investigated by the police just for taking photos of their kids on their phone.
  - Freak_NL 3y ago
    For this I would only consider something client-side encrypted a proper back-up when using the cloud.
  - 3y ago
swarnie 3y ago
Sure, to us technically minded types who work in the industry. Do you think the average erotic fiction writer is keeping abreast (lol) of cloud data access + integrity news?
- notaustinpowers 3y ago
  [flagged]
- interglossa 3y ago
  No. Dennis Cooper lost work this way years ago. They need to be aware of this and let some of their followers help them.
- bdw5204 3y ago
  I imagine the overwhelming majority of them barely even know how to use a computer and just use Google Docs because it's convenient and they can access it on their iPad or their laptop. Most people, even most tech-savvy types, value convenience more than privacy, security and even reliability of the service. People are also in denial and believe that arbitrary account suspensions or other arbitrary moderation decisions can't happen to them.
- idle_zealot 3y ago
  Worse, these cloud storage providers actively mislead users into thinking their files are safe and durable when stored on their services. Google Drive and Apple iCloud advertise themselves as a safe place to keep all of your data, and will nag users of Android and iOS devices respectively into enabling their storage services, setting them as the default storage provider for documents, and enabling automatic deletion of local copies to "free up space". They want users to rely on them for all of their photo/note/mosc documents storage and synchronization needs, it's good for their business if they do. But they also don't want to store anything questionable and be held legally responsible, so they automatically scan all of the "safely stored" documents, and purge users who get flagged. So their business incentives align such that they - coerce as many users as possible to become maximally dependent on their services - retract those service that users depend on for any slight or potential liability and if business incentives say you do something, you do it, and no amount of techies informing the masses is going to outperform Google or Apple's messaging. So how do we fix this? We change the incentives; if you delete someone's data you should be punished. They trusted you with it, they may have even paid you to store it. If you break that agreement then you deserve some heavy fines at a minimum.
hulitu 3y ago
> ll of these companies have shown repeatedly that they will cut off your access with no notice for any or no reason and with no recourse. And yet people never learn. Every couple of months you see someone begging for help on HN because Paypal, Stripe, Google and so on cut their access
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
aaomidi 3y ago
I’ve always argued that we need regulation that prevents large companies from just yeeting your data. At most they should be able to put it in RO mode to let you take it out.
- seanw444 3y ago
  Why bandaid fix it at the government level, when you can solve it right now by yourself: stop creating single points of failure. Store backups in multiple locations.
  - josephcsible 3y ago
    Because we all know that 99% of users aren't going to do that.
  - aaomidi 3y ago
    Because actually some problems need a regulation based solution.
exitb 3y ago
That take has a "victim blaming" vibe going on. Those texts were not lost, they were deleted. Yes, backups are a good idea, but we shouldn't just accept that kind of behaviour.
Waterluvian 3y ago
I don't necessarily disagree, but I feel it's important to call out every time I see it in a tech community: this is a reasonable sentiment for the less than 1% of cloud storage users who are sufficiently tech savvy. For the other 99% who have little more than marketing material to direct their understanding, the cloud is Fort Knox for your data.
shrimp_emoji 3y ago
Keep it on there in an encrypted volume! Cloud backup AND privacy in one.
- dotnet00 3y ago
  Wouldn't be surprised if "too much encrypted data" also triggers a ban because it'd stand out as unusual and a potential liability.
  - bdw5204 3y ago
    I suspect that large tech companies are going to be increasingly relying on AI moderation to identify "unusual" behavior and ban accounts for it. Failing to proactively ban a tiny obscure account posting illegal or extremely unpopular content just sets you up for political attacks either in the form of hostile new laws or of activist groups contacting your advertisers to convince them to stop doing business with you. Outlier users are definitely potential liabilities.
  - tbrownaw 3y ago
    Rather than a ban, that would probably be "you're acting like a business, so you need to switch to this much more expensive plan".
coderpath 3y ago
Richard Stallman has entered the chat...
koolba 3y ago
> Cloud backups used to be a smart thing to do. Now they are a liability. It’s not a backup when it’s the primary (and only!) copy.
npteljes 3y ago
Cloud backups are cool, it's the storing all eggs in one basket that's not cool. Whether that basket a cloud service, a hard disk or a pendrive.
PurpleRamen 3y ago
> All of these companies have shown repeatedly that they will cut off your access with no notice for any or no reason and with no recourse. The average user isn't aware of this. This kind of stories usually do not emerge in mainstream, or user-exclusive spaces.
philistine 3y ago
Don't write your smut on someone else's computer. If they're American, at some point the puritans will come knocking at the door.
offices 3y ago
Terraria's dev being (temporarily) burnt by this was the catalyst for my de-googling. There are high-quality alternatives for everything.
freitasm 3y ago
It's not cloud backup if it syncs two ways. My family use a mix of Office 365, Exchange Online and Google Workspace for email, documents, etc. Add to this the required Microsoft Account for Windows logins and OneDrive. I use a Synology NAS and they have packages to backup all these kinds of accounts, including versioning. Even if an account is closed their files and emails live in our NAS. If someone's life depends on anything digital, backup is a minor inconvenience or cost.

by paxys 3y ago

the_other 3y ago

They were always a liability. They were only ever "the smart thing" because they took some hassle away at the point of creating the backup.

giantg2 3y ago
They can still be smart for off-site backups in case of local catastrophic issues (like your house burning down). But they are just part of the solution and shouldn't be a single point of failure.

brianwawok 3y ago

All your eggs in 1 basket is never good. Local hard drive + a cloud provider should give you like 99.999999% reliability

jlkuester7 3y ago
> Local hard drive + a cloud provider This has been my general strategy for personal data. I have also been trying to figure out if there was a reasonable way to get long-term very-cold storage (e.g. backups of family pictures). Something that would last decades just sitting in a fire-box somewhere (reasonable temps, no moisture). Been considering https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M-DISC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M-DISC, but interested to know if anyone has other ideas...
- Filligree 3y ago
  Don't quote me on this, but Bluray is apparently supposed to be long-term stable. I haven't explored the claim.
ryandrake 3y ago
Key point is that the cloud provider version should not be your "main" version, it should be used for backup only. If it's not on your physical computer that you have direct access to, it's not -your- data anymore.
Turing_Machine 3y ago
I actually use three local hard drives in rotation plus a cloud provider to hopefully cover the "building catches on fire and I don't even have time grab a drive" scenario. Maybe a second cloud provider would also be good. I'm going to think about this.

giantg2 3y ago

"Cloud backups used to be a smart thing to do. Now they are a liability." If they're actually a backup they can be a good idea. If it's a single source, then yeah, it's asking for trouble. I even backup my GitHub stuff locally because who knows what could happen.

lupusreal 3y ago
Even if the files are actually a backup it's not a good idea if it also gets your email/etc accounts nuked. Megacorps with many online properties are landmine fields because you can get banned from a dozen services for a BS 'violation' on just one of them.
- giantg2 3y ago
  That idea is true for the rest of those services too. We could just stop using all the services if they are all run by the same Corp and subjected to the same BS rules. If your Google drive got banned for explicit material, it's only a matter of time your Gmail would trigger it because you sent drafts between you and your publisher instead of using Drive. If it's a true backup, it should be encrypted in my opinion, especially on the cloud. Then it doesn't matter since they can't see it.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
paxys 3y ago
Even if they are just a backup, all these companies scan your data for offensive material and report it to the authorities if their algorithm deems it fit. There have been plenty of cases of parents being investigated by the police just for taking photos of their kids on their phone.
- Freak_NL 3y ago
  For this I would only consider something client-side encrypted a proper back-up when using the cloud.
- 3y ago

swarnie 3y ago

Sure, to us technically minded types who work in the industry. Do you think the average erotic fiction writer is keeping abreast (lol) of cloud data access + integrity news?

notaustinpowers 3y ago
[flagged]
interglossa 3y ago
No. Dennis Cooper lost work this way years ago. They need to be aware of this and let some of their followers help them.
bdw5204 3y ago
I imagine the overwhelming majority of them barely even know how to use a computer and just use Google Docs because it's convenient and they can access it on their iPad or their laptop. Most people, even most tech-savvy types, value convenience more than privacy, security and even reliability of the service. People are also in denial and believe that arbitrary account suspensions or other arbitrary moderation decisions can't happen to them.
idle_zealot 3y ago
Worse, these cloud storage providers actively mislead users into thinking their files are safe and durable when stored on their services. Google Drive and Apple iCloud advertise themselves as a safe place to keep all of your data, and will nag users of Android and iOS devices respectively into enabling their storage services, setting them as the default storage provider for documents, and enabling automatic deletion of local copies to "free up space". They want users to rely on them for all of their photo/note/mosc documents storage and synchronization needs, it's good for their business if they do. But they also don't want to store anything questionable and be held legally responsible, so they automatically scan all of the "safely stored" documents, and purge users who get flagged. So their business incentives align such that they - coerce as many users as possible to become maximally dependent on their services - retract those service that users depend on for any slight or potential liability and if business incentives say you do something, you do it, and no amount of techies informing the masses is going to outperform Google or Apple's messaging. So how do we fix this? We change the incentives; if you delete someone's data you should be punished. They trusted you with it, they may have even paid you to store it. If you break that agreement then you deserve some heavy fines at a minimum.

hulitu 3y ago

> ll of these companies have shown repeatedly that they will cut off your access with no notice for any or no reason and with no recourse. And yet people never learn. Every couple of months you see someone begging for help on HN because Paypal, Stripe, Google and so on cut their access

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

aaomidi 3y ago

I’ve always argued that we need regulation that prevents large companies from just yeeting your data. At most they should be able to put it in RO mode to let you take it out.

seanw444 3y ago
Why bandaid fix it at the government level, when you can solve it right now by yourself: stop creating single points of failure. Store backups in multiple locations.
- josephcsible 3y ago
  Because we all know that 99% of users aren't going to do that.
- aaomidi 3y ago
  Because actually some problems need a regulation based solution.

exitb 3y ago

That take has a "victim blaming" vibe going on. Those texts were not lost, they were deleted. Yes, backups are a good idea, but we shouldn't just accept that kind of behaviour.

Waterluvian 3y ago

I don't necessarily disagree, but I feel it's important to call out every time I see it in a tech community: this is a reasonable sentiment for the less than 1% of cloud storage users who are sufficiently tech savvy. For the other 99% who have little more than marketing material to direct their understanding, the cloud is Fort Knox for your data.

shrimp_emoji 3y ago

Keep it on there in an encrypted volume! Cloud backup AND privacy in one.

dotnet00 3y ago
Wouldn't be surprised if "too much encrypted data" also triggers a ban because it'd stand out as unusual and a potential liability.
- bdw5204 3y ago
  I suspect that large tech companies are going to be increasingly relying on AI moderation to identify "unusual" behavior and ban accounts for it. Failing to proactively ban a tiny obscure account posting illegal or extremely unpopular content just sets you up for political attacks either in the form of hostile new laws or of activist groups contacting your advertisers to convince them to stop doing business with you. Outlier users are definitely potential liabilities.
- tbrownaw 3y ago
  Rather than a ban, that would probably be "you're acting like a business, so you need to switch to this much more expensive plan".

coderpath 3y ago

Richard Stallman has entered the chat...

koolba 3y ago

> Cloud backups used to be a smart thing to do. Now they are a liability. It’s not a backup when it’s the primary (and only!) copy.

npteljes 3y ago

Cloud backups are cool, it's the storing all eggs in one basket that's not cool. Whether that basket a cloud service, a hard disk or a pendrive.

PurpleRamen 3y ago

> All of these companies have shown repeatedly that they will cut off your access with no notice for any or no reason and with no recourse. The average user isn't aware of this. This kind of stories usually do not emerge in mainstream, or user-exclusive spaces.

philistine 3y ago

Don't write your smut on someone else's computer. If they're American, at some point the puritans will come knocking at the door.

offices 3y ago

Terraria's dev being (temporarily) burnt by this was the catalyst for my de-googling. There are high-quality alternatives for everything.

freitasm 3y ago

It's not cloud backup if it syncs two ways. My family use a mix of Office 365, Exchange Online and Google Workspace for email, documents, etc. Add to this the required Microsoft Account for Windows logins and OneDrive. I use a Synology NAS and they have packages to backup all these kinds of accounts, including versioning. Even if an account is closed their files and emails live in our NAS. If someone's life depends on anything digital, backup is a minor inconvenience or cost.