I've been a paying Dropbox customer for years. I've stored tens of thousands of photos there and even some personal data. I never really thought about it until I read about how the keys from the Bitcoin Bitfinex hack were recovered. I've had it in mind to eliminate these mainstream apps like Dropbox, Google Drive, etc., but this latest story was my call to action.
On January 31, 2022, law enforcement gained access to Wallet 1CGA4s by decrypting a file saved to LICHTENSTEINโs cloud storage account, which had been obtained pursuant to a search warrant (src)
That's right, they were stored on a 'cloud storage account'. And if a search warrant was obtained, that means the unspecified cloud storage company stored the data in the clear. Had the encrypted file been stored on encrypted cloud storage, (i.e. double encrypted), law enforcement would have had a much tougher time gaining access to the data. Anyways, I'm not sure if they were actually using Dropbox, but I know that Apple iCloud are NOT encrypted. As a matter of fact, Apple plans to scan your files under the guise of 'protecting children'. Those plans were recently delayed. (src) Because of these developments, I decided to re-evaluate my cloud storage choices.
Here are the main points(src).
advocate bigotry or hatred against any person or group of people based on their race, religion, ethnicity, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, disability, or impairment;
violate the law in any way, including storing, publishing or sharing material thatโs fraudulent, defamatory, or misleading, or that violates the intellectual property rights of others;
violate the privacy or infringe the rights of others
Aside from privacy concerns, I've also had strange issues where my files would disappear and then show up in my deleted files folder-- not cool. Yet another reason to bail, and I don't need to spend any time contacting their tech support.
Located in San Francisco, Dropbox is one of your typical woke Silicon valley companies. I get the feeling they would have no problem joining the deplatforming dogpile should you run afoul of their ideology. Their respect for your privacy doesn't extend beyond their corporate interests.
As a replacement, I have chosen Sync:
Referral link: https://www.sync.com/?_sync_refer=92ddcf9d0
Sync supports end-to-end encryption, which mitigates basically all of the concerns I had with Dropbox. They actually pride and market themselves as not being Dropbox. Below is a capture from their website.
The interface for Sync is not quite as refined as that of Dropbox, but that's a trade-off I'm willing to make. Their 2TB is also cheaper than Dropbox ($8/mo vs. $10/mo) which is great. While Sync could still deny me access based upon who I am, they could not do so based upon what I am storing on their platform.
While I may never need to store the keys to Billions of dollars worth of Bitcoin, or anything illegal. I value my privacy, and seek out companies that do as well. For example, about two years ago I switched from using Gmail to Protonmail. Addressing my cloud storage is a great next step. Eliminating Google Drive will be next. The problem there is that I'm using google Docs/Sheets, so I'll need to find another solution to import/edit my documents.
Note: Even if you use cloud storage, you should still keep a backup on an offline drive-- an encrypted one if it contains personal data.