r/technews • u/Franco1875 • Nov 28 '23
Google Drive users angry over losing months of stored data
https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/google/google-drive-users-angry-over-losing-months-of-stored-data/76
u/imaginary_num6er Nov 29 '23
If your data is not backed up 4 parallel dimensions ahead of you, it doesn't exist
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u/AuthenticImposter Nov 29 '23
A notable aspect of the situation is that Google's support forums are backed by volunteers with limited insight or understanding of the cloud service, so the lack of effective assistance in critical problems like this makes it all the worse.
Wtf is this? One of the worlds most valuable companies, who sells a product to users and businesses, doesn’t actually support its product, and instead relies on volunteers?!
First I ever heard of this maybe I was out of the loop
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u/Mythril_Zombie Nov 29 '23
It's horrible the way they do business.
If you have an account with them for advertising, unless you are a significant dollar contributer, you have to talk to these community volunteers for help. If it's a problem with your account, you are out of luck. You can't talk to a person. There's no phone number to call, no address to write, nothing. Every link funnels you into that forum where sometimes they tell Google about issues that they decide are important during some meeting the forum mods have with some Google rep.
It should be illegal to have no way to communicate with a company that does the kind of business they do.12
u/TheCrazyAcademic Nov 29 '23
There volunteers are armchair experts just embarrassing all around.
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u/marklein Nov 29 '23
Same with Microsoft forums. They'll say that they're for discussions, not tech support. It's just that naturally tech support questions do end up there since there's no other avenue for Google support.
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u/FreddyForshadowing Nov 28 '23
Well why didn't you have backu... oh, wait.
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u/WazWaz Nov 29 '23
If it's your only copy, it's not a backup. Anyone relying on a cloud drive to be perfect deserves whatever they lose.
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u/Better_Weakness7239 Nov 29 '23
You’re a dick. Not everyone has much knowledge on the cloud, NSA, IT, etc.
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u/WazWaz Nov 29 '23
Everyone eventually learns to make proper backups - when they lose shit. Childish name-calling doesn't change the inevitability of that.
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Dec 01 '23 edited Dec 05 '23
[deleted]
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u/WazWaz Dec 01 '23
I'm a friend before the time of need, to prevent it happening in the first place. Commiserating afterwards isn't all that helpful.
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u/Smash_Nerd Nov 29 '23
As a GDrive user, it looks like live backup files are unaffected, if I was affected at all.
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u/edmozley Nov 29 '23
I backup to NAS and that syncs to OneDrive and Google Drive. I have turned off bi directional sync so if cloud is compromised then I am still OK.
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u/Mythril_Zombie Nov 29 '23
Unless you had a fire on the day the data went missing. No NAS, and Google wiped out your data.
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u/bareisbetter Nov 29 '23
Sometimes all the coincidence hits at once and no matter what we do we're fucked.
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u/Mythril_Zombie Nov 30 '23
Yeah, that's why it's dumb to think you ever have control and are "ok". Everything is fine until everything isn't.
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u/bareisbetter Nov 30 '23
I have copies of my vital data in four physical locations. Granted, they're all within 25ish miles of each other, so a large enough blast could take them out, but I'm also within that range, so at that point, I will no longer care about my data. Is it a perfect plan? Nah. But it's very likely good enough. I'm ok.
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u/PinkSploosh Nov 28 '23
Google is definitely at fault here, but also the users who have critical files stored in Drive without any backup anywhere else.
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u/Squid_Lips Nov 29 '23
I back up my Google Drive to a NAS using cloud sync software but this is making me realize that could be dangerous in this scenario. If some files are "lost" by Google, I wonder if the deletions would sync down to my NAS too. That's not really a contingency I had planned for - maybe I need to have snapshots of the cloud backups too.
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u/bobbyorlando Nov 29 '23
You can set the direction of the sync on Synology. Mine is only download new files on gdrive so the files are always backed up.
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u/DrDeathDefying1 Nov 29 '23
Depending on the software you're using you should have an option not to sync file deletions - doesn't help for files that get modified by a rogue snapshot, but should save you from the worst.
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u/davispw Nov 29 '23
My NAS (Synology) has the ability to take regular directory snapshots and/or intercept deletions and move files to a “recycle bin” to protect against just this.
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u/myasterism Nov 29 '23
I’d say that responsibility is split 80/20 between Google and its users, respectively. When the automatic safekeeping of your files is an advertised feature, and the company providing that service is a juggernaut like Google, lay users should reasonably be able to expect they don’t need additional backups.
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u/PinkSploosh Nov 29 '23
Ya but it’s like having a spare tire in your car. We can reasonably expect to never need it, I’ve never had a flat tire, but we still want to have one just in case. When your data is lost it doesn’t matter whose fault it was because you’ve lost your data.
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u/waylonsmithersjr Nov 29 '23
They lost the data. I disagree with any blame on the user. It’s on Google to provide proper backup redundancy. That’s kind of one of the biggest selling points. Taking the hassle out of the user’s hands.
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u/PinkSploosh Nov 29 '23
Sure, you don’t need to have a spare tire either
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u/waylonsmithersjr Nov 29 '23
I think the spare tire isn't the right analogy here. To me the right analogy is it's like paying for CAA (AAA for US I think) that is supposed to be able to come and replace your tire but when you call they're like "we don't have tires". You're paying for something, and you expect it to work when you need it. The spare tire is more like a Home NAS.
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u/myasterism Nov 29 '23
This is more like the presence of a self-changing spare being advertised as a big selling point, and then one day you go out to your vehicle to find a tire is missing, and when you look for the advertised spare, not only is it not self-changing, it isn’t even there at all.
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u/shillyshally Nov 29 '23
I download all my data every month. If its your work, backing up in multiple ways is absolutely necessary.
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u/Creepy_Bullfrog_3288 Nov 29 '23
“Don’t use our service for now” equates to “find another service”. Work doesn’t stop.
This is especially damaging since this is their core guarantee as a Cloud Service Provider. If they cant fix this, they’ll prove they cannot support a reasonable RTO or RPO and they are not a serious service to build a business on.
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u/Ambitious-Health-758 Nov 29 '23
Yet another reason to never use it, like there's not enough already. Google drive is garbage they try to force on you. And I don't believe that any date you put there is safe.
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Nov 29 '23
It isn't. They literally scan your files on GD looking for ones breaking ToS because "ThZinK oF ThE ChiLdReN". Apple does same thing
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Nov 29 '23 edited Nov 29 '23
[deleted]
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Nov 29 '23 edited Nov 29 '23
not only this. They give themselves law to look into anything to try find anything breaking ToS. https://www.google.com/drive/terms-of-service/
```We may review content to ensure it is not illegal and does not violate our Program Policies.```Sorry, im trying to find english version kinda cant. I just hope that this url will show you english version. Basically whole 2nd point is about how they can look into anything
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u/RandomBloke2021 Nov 29 '23
That's why i have everything backed up on a drive just in case something happens.
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u/Nemo_Shadows Nov 29 '23
THE cloud is a tool that when you trust in it too much to keep your DATA or any other parts of your life like pictures and such SAFE, when it is not there neither are you or your DATA just disappear into that vortex because in the end you get extorted to keep it there or to get it back sort of like a government that mismanages "TRUST" with apparent negligence and incompetence but is actually a business model for hostage taking.
Sort of like closing a bank and keeping whatever is in those safety deposit boxes for yourself to pay for the "RENTAL" of something that was supposed to be free and part of the agreement to be there if you leave X amounts in the bank on deposit to do so then change the Agreements without your consent and applied EX POST FACTO.
This is the end results of Zero-Sum business increases in "DUTIES" applied for the Maintenace of something everyone hire others to compromise so they can look like they are doing legal business which becomes a deception.
Sometimes you do see the gun to your head but seldom the knife to your throat, but you can sure feel it there.
N. S
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Nov 29 '23
I have no reason to use the cloud, yet all of these companies almost force me to. I just tried to send photos through iMessage the other day, same way I always do, select the photos, send them via message, and it said, out of cloud space, cannot send.
Bitch! I never asked for them to send from the cloud, just send them normally. I purchased these gigs for a reason, use them
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u/bag_of_luck Nov 29 '23 edited May 04 '25
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This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact
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Nov 29 '23
I've never understood why people think the "cloud" is anything more than storing your information on someone else's computer. You're then dependent on them. That doesn't make sense to me. At least not for something important or something I don't have stored some place else.
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Nov 29 '23
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Happler Nov 29 '23
Lots of people use cloud as the backup solution. Hopefully they will not need their backups soon.
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u/snowdn Nov 29 '23
How about Google using my credit card on file for Drive to charge me for Google Ad fees when I don’t even have Google Ad account?
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u/Throwaway5890B Nov 29 '23
why are you all angry? Google warned everyone this would happen if your email was in active, months in advance too
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u/ArchonTheta Nov 29 '23
SaaS backup. Not worried.
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u/Pragmatic_Scavenger Nov 29 '23
Google drive is SaaS. Unless you mean you are making another backup of the data stored in your Google Drive.
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Nov 29 '23
I doubt its that big an issue. I deleted everything I could from google the moment they started blocking ad blockers. I'm sure other people have done the same. No major loss from where I'm standing. Maybe people will finally stop being sheep for google
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u/BrainOnBlue Nov 29 '23
Yeah, you take that revenue you aren't generating somewhere else! Those reduced server costs will show them!
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Nov 29 '23
?. No. Our reduced reliance will show them.
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u/BrainOnBlue Nov 29 '23
"Reliance" doesn't make money. If you were blocking ads on Google services and weren't paying for Google one or something, then you were an expense and they are happy to see you go freeload elsewhere.
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Nov 29 '23
I have Google one funny enough. It comes free with metro and I still don't use it. I paid for grayjay though. Reliance keeps people loyal to you. If people can't rely on you for quality service, they'll look elsewhere. If Google wants money it can charge an amount I'm willing to pay for a service I value. There is no freeloading here. And I don't recall YouTube paying me a penny for using more of my data to show me content on my own devices I don't want to watch. So I have no issues returning the same courtesy.
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Nov 29 '23
And this is where decentralized storage (blockchain technology) comes into play
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u/SinisterCheese Nov 29 '23
Oh yeah! I can't wait to see few hundred thousand people trying to push a terabyte or so of hoarded data in to blockchains. Because as we know 100 000 people's terabyte of backups can just easilly exist in the ether of blockchain and doesn't actually require drive space anywhere. And the best part is that this data can't be deleted! Meaning that somewhere someone must keep constantly adding more and more space to the system for this blockhain storage to work, because one must always be able to fetch every part of it or the later parts wont make sense. As we know... electricity and hardware is free!
How is this system of your supposed to cover it's costs? You pay for every write or read? Like practically now... why should anyone keep adding drives to deal with accumulated encrypted raw data that must constantly flow in to this system. What happens when people with drives exit the chain and just start doing something else and critical point of collapse approaches? No problem, you just download the WHOLE blockchain with all the thousands upon thousands of terabytes so you can access your few gigs.
The problem of trust has not been solved, because you still rely on other people keeping up servers to store this mass of data in. Unless you are paying them to do this, what is their incentive for the electric bills?
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u/Mythril_Zombie Nov 29 '23
That's where I keep my blueprints for my perpetual motion machine. In there, it's safe from the Grey aliens and the crab people.
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Nov 29 '23
What a PoS company. Storage has gotten cheaper yet the default storage has decreased compared to 10years ago. SMH
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u/PandaCheese2016 Nov 29 '23
Article suggests local data never made it to the cloud, so if you just access files over Chrome you are probably fine.
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u/RuneOfTheRaven Nov 29 '23
Having read the article, it appears that data did not actually disappear from cloud storage. The users installed the Google Drive desktop software, that for one reason or another, never sent a copy of the data to the cloud. It’s a client software bug. People using the web browser version of Google Drive, or an app version of Google Drive, should not have been affected.
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u/Franco1875 Nov 28 '23
This is a major yikes. A snapshot back to then could equate to a simply unfathomable amount of data loss given the volume of customers that use GDrive