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Dropbox and Box Leaked Shared Private Files Through Google
judgecorp writes: "People using shared storage providers such as Box and Dropbox are leaking data, a competitor has discovered. Links to shared files leak out when those links are accidentally put into the Google search box, or if users click links from within the documents. Dropbox competitor Intralinks stumbled across mortgage applications and bank statements while checking Google Analytics data for a Google Adwords campaign. Graham Cluley explains the problem in detail and suggests answers: for Dropbox users, it means upgrading to the Business version, which lets you restrict access to shared document links."
Dropbox has posted an official response and disabled access to previously shared links. Box made a vague statement about their awareness of the issue.
Technically they didn't leak private files, because the files weren't ever private. They were public with the URLs not published in an index anywhere, so you had to know the URL to access them. Dropbox and Box simply forgot that those URLs would appear in HTTP Referer headers, exposing them in the logs of any site linked to from within those "private" documents. Security by obscurity... isn't.
A document isn't private unless it requires at least some kind of authentication to access it, eg. setting up HTTP authentication, or using a system like Google Drive uses where you have to be logged in on your Google account to see documents shared with you.
>The trick is simple -- if the files are small, but too big to E-mail, PGP/gpg encrypt them, then send the links via a secure message. If the files are bigger (~50-100 megs or larger), then the file goes into a TrueCrypt volume that uses a keyfile, and the keyfile is GPG encrypted and E-mailed.
You have a much different definition of "simple" than most people. Few people (who are not techies) find transferring a file via GPG or TrueCrypt to be "simple". Even getting them to download the file from a cloud provider can be a chore "I clicked on the link but nothing happened! What do you mean I need to look in my Downloads folder?"
I've always hated the move toward "omnibar" seach field/URL field combos for this very reason. Add in dynamic search suggesting and every damn thing many (if not most) of the people on the planet put in that field gets sent to Google. Anything Google does with the URL bar is solely for their own advantage. No thanks.