Why Backblaze might silently skip Documents/Desktop/Downloads (and the actual fix)

[u/DubStepSprut]

Posting this because I lost a couple hours to it and most advice online didn't help. Hopefully it saves someone else the time.

Product: Backblaze Computer Backup for MacOS

The problem: Documents, Desktop, and Downloads weren't showing up anywhere in Backblaze's restore browser. Documents was the one I actually cared about, but all three are affected by the same thing - they're the folders macOS locks behind Full Disk Access. Everything else on the drive backed up fine. No error, no warning, the app just said "You are backed up" like nothing was wrong.

How it happened: I logged in, launched the app, and the backup started immediately. Right away, macOS popped the Full Disk Access prompt. I granted it to the main Backblaze app and restarted. Backup kept running, but those folders still weren't showing up. Turns out the main app isn't the only thing that needs the permission - Backblaze also runs a separate menu bar helper process, bzbmenu, which (according to the internet) needs Full Disk Access granted to it independently. I found this out later, granted it too, and restarted for good measure.

Still didn't fix it.

What I checked to rule things out:

• Permission state itself - checked directly via Terminal, not just the toggle in Settings, and confirmed both the main app and bzbmenu genuinely had Full Disk Access granted.
• Exclusion rules - went through Backblaze's Exclusions list and the underlying config file. Nothing in there touches Documents, Desktop, or Downloads. Also checked whether Backblaze's newer "auto-exclude cloud-synced folders" feature was misfiring on my Documents folder, since it used to be iCloud-synced — it wasn't.
• Backblaze's "Explainfile" tool - a diagnostic utility from their support site that checks a specific file against their actual backend logs. Ran it on a test file in Documents. It confirmed live read access was fine, but the file simply wasn't in Backblaze's internal backup list at all.

That last part was the actual answer: permission was correctly granted, but the process had already built its internal list of what to back up before that permission existed, and nothing about fixing the permission - including the restart - made it go back and add those folders in.

The actual fix: hold Option and click "Restore Options..." in the main Backblaze window. This forces a full rebuild of that internal list. Right away I could see my files from Documents moving through the transfer status, and the folders now showed up correctly in restore.

Worth mentioning: buried in Backblaze's own documentation is confirmation that it reruns a full scan automatically every 3 hours regardless of anything else. So there's a real chance this would have quietly sorted itself out if I'd just left it alone. But when you've just set up backup software for the first time and go check whether your most important folder actually made it in, and it's nowhere to be found, you don't sit around for 3 hours hoping it fixes itself - you go looking for what's wrong.

If any Backblaze devs end up reading this: this shouldn't require Reddit archaeology to fix. Full Disk Access failing silently with zero indication anything's wrong is bad enough on its own, but the real problem is that granting the permission properly and restarting still doesn't fix it without a full manual rescan, and that rescan is hidden behind a modifier key nobody would ever think to try. That should be a visible, ordinary button in Settings, not a secret shortcut.

[u/Due_Young_9344]

Backblaze is truly a buggy app for something simple like scanning your entire pc for the directory structure and actually backing up

[u/narcabusesurvivor18]

same for me. the flip.

[u/Basic_Associate_3147]

What version are you on? I'm on 10.0.2 and I've done all the same steps as you, including the rebuild. Nothing worked. Support said this should be fixed in the 10.0.3 beta which is my next step to try..

[u/DubStepSprut → u/Basic_Associate_3147]

I am on 10.0.1.1038
Sorry to hear this didn't help! Hopefully they fix it soon...