Slashdot Mirror
The Cloud: Convenient Until a Stranger Nukes Your Files
jfruh writes "Thanks to a plethora of cloud storage accounts, Dan Tynan thought his days of carrying a thumb drive around with him and worrying about email stripping out his attachments were over. But that was before he discovered that his Box.com account and all the files in it had vanished without a trace. With tech support coming up empty, Tynan had to put on his journalist hat to track down the bizarre sequence of events that ended with his account handed over to another user, who didn't ask for it and didn't even know who Tynan was."
Cloud services take all of your IT problems, and give them to someone else, period. A cloud is not inherently going to fix your problems, or make them worse, but just delegate them to someone who may or may not be able to handle them better.
You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.
FTFA:
* Financial records. I scan all my paychecks and store them (on SkyDrive, not Box.com - fortunately). Our tax form PDFs are all on some cloud storage service, either SkyDrive or Dropbox, as are all our receipts. These would have been in the hands of a total stranger - perfect fodder for identity theft. And if the IRS suddenly decided to audit us? We'd be at their mercy.
* Health records. We scan all our doctors bills and insurance insurance statements and store them in the cloud. So now we're talking about medical identity theft for us and our kids - a situation that's much harder to resolve than standard financial ID theft.
What an idiot.
I can't remember where I first heard this, but the quote is along the lines of:
Whenever you hear a reference to "the cloud", replace it with "someone else's computer" and see how much sense it makes
Once you start doing that it shows you how little control you have over such services and how dependent you are on other parties, especially if you consider them as a panacea to not having to keep your own backups (as the OP seems to have done)
I am Slashdot. Are you Slashdot as well?
I can sum up exactly why people do it in three words: fast, easy, convenient.
Once you start handling it yourself, all three of those are going to take a hit - and for non-technical people, it can be a pretty heavy hit.
Cloud storage can not be trusted both in terms of privacy and reliability. So follow these steps and you'll be fine:
1) Thou shalt not store unencrypted files in the cloud
2) Thou shalt have backups of files in the cloud
Does that reduce the convenience of the cloud? Yes. Because that is all that online cloud storage can offer - unreliable privacy invading storage.
For the "someone nuked all my files", this is why you should backup your files (or use a Cloud service with integrated backup/history or better use both).
Remember, a proper Backup uses MULTIPLE Backups and not all from the same service provider.
PS: for the "someone saw all by financial records", you should use an encrypted Cloud service where YOU own the encryption key and where the service provider can NOT help you should you ever lose that key.
Sig (appended to the end of comments you post, 120 chars)
What I find interesting is that you appear not to have backed up the files elsewhere. While I appreciate the convenience cloud storage offers I also make sure all my files are backed up on some other media so if the cloud goes poof at least I don't lose anything. In your example, you were fortunate it was am administrative error and not box.com simply going out of business overnight. Had that happened, you might never get your files back or even worse someone would have a HD full of you data bought at a bankruptcy auction; which as a second point makes me wonder why you would store such sensitive information as pay checks / tax forms / etc. anywhere nut media you have physical control of to ensure it's security.
On a side note, it is interesting the difference in response you get when you say "I am writing an article..." vs "I need help..."
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.