[PCWorld]

Post your comments for Will Your Data Disappear When Your Online Storage Site Shuts Down? here

[Reuntes]

While studying for my IT certs, the instructor told us over and over again that if data is important to us, we keep it backed up in three different places.
While I prefer to use online backups, I always keep another backup on a CD-RW and on a flash drive.
When we meet with customers, we tell them this, especially if they're coming to us for data recovery.

[gotjoy]

I am a member of

http://groups.google...estoration-team



and we have failed to get yahoo to return our files after they erroneously notified us we had a day longer then they gave us.



One of us has had his email deactivated in retaliation by yahoo after gettting them to agree to mail out a cd of his files, which they have

done, but still refuse to restore an account that he uses for work just because he told others about his success in yahoo answers!



Please help us we include the entire gamut and we believe our files still exist. This conduct has destroyed our lives and this is not an exageration.



Don't just sell your yahoo stock. Protect it's value before it's too late.



During the weeks prior to the snafu they didn't make it possible to download the files even if they got notice to us- whihc in many cases they did not- and they didn't

even try to notify us until nearly as much as has passed now since the shutdown occured after they decided to notify investors of shedding our service that did

win an award as tops in the catagory jsut last year in fact they shut it to prevent it from winning again perhaps.



Please post any info to our group or here we just don't understand how this can occur.... it is more then astonishing.

[Evildave]

An external 1TB USB2 drive costs around $90.

So for $180, you could have two complete, almost bottomless backups. Keep one at friend's house and one on-site. Swap 'em when you visit.

Since online backup sites charge a monthly fee, how many months would it take to pay for a pair of hard drives that will last for 5~10 years?

[JohnCohen]

What I have is a second hard drive and a local backup program called GoodSync.

Call me a control freak, but I just don't trust outsiders with my photos or any of my data. With dirves being so inexpensive nowadays, it's better and cheaper to buy your own drive and software and do it yourself.

[OldOnliner]

A good backup always includes an off-site backup. If you can do that with portable HDs and a sneaker net, all the more good for you. BUT if your work flow doesn't permit it or makes that too difficult your only recourse is an online service.
Let's hope some of the new services - Moozy, Carbonite, etc. - have REAL business plans, designed for real profitability instead some flash-in-the-pan techie startup splash with no future beyond some big hype, some venture capital, an IPO, and eventual buyout/cash out.

[techie4fun]

It will if you don't have your backup saved in OTHER places.

[TechieXP]

100% CORRECT!

Even still, suppose the online backup server crashes...? Suppose there is a fire? Suppose they get banded? Suppose the owner disappears...suppose they don't warn you they are shutting down? 24 hours is't enough time for millions of people to get there stuff back. 7000 files? Even if they were all less than 100k and you were using Comcast, you wouldn't be able to get all of them in that time with others using the same server to get theirs. That seem illegal.

I am sure when this all started 1TB drive were either to expensive or non existant. But by now...even a 250GB drive is bigg enough to hold 7000 files and the cost about $50.

I think storing your data on a server that isn't yours isn't practical. How hard is it to buy a drive..copy the files to it...stick it back in the box until you need it?

[luvduchovny]

Yeah, I got popped when Streamload with unlimited storage morphed into mediamax where you were going to get charged depending on how many gbs you had stored. The transfer wasn't pretty but I didn't lose too much and they promised to honor folks who had just paid streamload (so I wasn't charged for the extra storage). Then it moved to TheLinkUp that lost 70% of my files (It wasn't a hardship I had 99% of those files stored on my computer at home or saved on dvds). I went through a Paypal mixup for heck trying to pay for the service (They REALLY WANTED a credit card). Then after two months of missteps of continued lost data transfers from Mediamax, they put a "We give up" notice and we had I think two weeks to get all our files off.
Trying to find a new service wasn't as easy as it used to be. In the end I've divvied up some of my files between two sites, Mediafire and DivShare. But I don't upload very much to either. I refuse to make either site the place to back up my files. Instead I invested in a D-Link 2-Bay Nas enclosure and I back up stuff there. I use the others when I need to share some files with friends and that's about it.

[luvduchovny]

I'll tell you when you would need an online presences for some files you back up. If you need to share files among some people and they are too large to email. On these sites you could just send the friend or family member a link to where the file is and they could download it to their computers. You had control on who could or couldn't get to your files. What happened if the storage was down? When it was Streamload you got an email apology and they would comp by giving you a little more storage space for free or knocking a few bucks off the fee for their service. They never lost my files (although they went missing when it moved to TheLinkUp which is no more).

No one should only rely on one method of backing up. Back in the day terabyte drives were really expensive. I was backing up to external drives of 200 GB in my home, but for things I wanted to share with friends or family I had those things on an online storage site.

[Evildave]

What I'm seeing from all these posts is people are using online backup services... AND NOTHING ELSE.

Not only that, they're using it is the primary or ONLY means of storing files, which means there is no backup for those files but the promise that the dot-com will still be in business next week, and their personal assurance that your data is 'safe'.

So, even if you use an online backup, it's absolutely no substitute for an external backup drive that you can backup to, unplug and put away. There are nifty toaster-shaped gadgets that let you drop naked SATA drives in, but realistically a USB2/Firewire/ESATA enclosure costs less than $20, and the cost for naked drives versus drives in enclosures is nearly the same online. Anything that keeps the parts/circuit board from getting scratched is probably going to be better.

Especially for drive image backups, large backups of media, backups of virtual machines, etc.

Face it, external hard disk storage is dirt cheap compared to ANY other backup media, orders of magnitude faster, and more convenient. And convenience wins. If your backup 'sucks' you won't do it.

I personally use a script with rsync, but for windoze I used to use 'robocopy'. Both command-line based. You can make a desktop shortcut to either kind.

Both do INCREMENTAL backups, which is critical. The first backup will take hours. The second (and remaining backups) will take minutes. It only copies what changed.

For examples of the scripts...

forums.pcworld.com/docs/DOC-1671|d-1671

[petesteege]

Amen, EvilDave. Gotta have a physical copy of your data. Newer storage devices make it very easy, and it's always going to be quicker recovering all of your data locally vs. over internet.

Used to be a one-touch process, now with products like Seagate Replica, it's a no-touch process once it's plugged in.

[PoorBird]

I must agree with EvilDave and some others here....large USB HD's are just too cheap
now to go any other way.... and because I am
old-fashioned, there is no way I would trust
ANYTHING of even minor importance to the i'net cloud...
tooooo many storms up there to suit me.

[nastone]

Let me introduce you (Ryan Pyle you listening?) neat little concept called a local copy stored on your computer and then burned to a CD or USB drive. Only a real moron is gonna leave important files on some online service and not make a backup on his computer.

I do photography too and can find all my photos pretty easily on my computer and the back discs.

[RNR19952]

I could never figure out why people would trust their precious data to strangers! I always advise my customers against any online storage for that reason.

[PoorBird]

You and several others posting on this question have made me feel a lot better.....I was beginning to think I was a dinosaur on the way out!.....I fully intend to keep everything discrete.... programs, storage, and so forth....no cloud for this bird......I must admit to maintaining a Gmail account primarily used as an off-campus storage facility for a certain class of emails...seems to work for my purposes.

[rem736]

why is this article even necessary? i thought that it was a no brainer to have a local back up copy on an external drive, whether or not you have storage in the cloud. in fact, you can even make your local backup copy your very own "cloud" service by configuring the external local drive with ftp using a free service from dyndns. if you have a static ip address for your internet service, you don't even need dyndns. if that's not enough, and you're worried that an always connected drive is more prone to failure, then have another external drive that you only turn on to make backups. there are only two advantages to a cloud service: 1. accessible anywhere; 2. location-based disasters will not cause you to lose your data. the drive you configure with ftp service gives you accessibility. the "turn on only when you backup" drive can be taken with you and stored in a bank vault or shipped across the country/world for off-site storage with a friend/family member.

[chevrolet1994]

In 2006 on line storage was the "in" thing,unfortunatly,the economy headed south and a lot free and paid on line storage sites pulled the plug.

I agree, for less than $200 you can purchase 2 1TB external hard drives and have unlimited storage space.

[hurtnotwrong]

Many have noted how if you own a PC you have storage that retain info after you turn the sucker off, and how you can buy gigs for bucks and storage for less then this article says it costs a yahoo for just a month.



So obviously it's not about such people or companies! It's about those of us who use other people's machines not just store on the web. We have other people maintain them, install the software, adn don't trust them to store our files rather we use the web as our network and did use yahoo to store a tiny amount of data.



We trusted yahoo and they in turn missled us when they decided to make a show out of being cheap with us. To save a fraction of cent for each of us they shut it a day earlier then they knew they had led many of us to believe- those of us who trusted them.



How small a fraction? Maybe just a ten thousandth or less of a cent. Maybe not even that much system wide.



This was weeks ago of course. Almost months now. Yet we don't have our files. FIles of say combinations to padlocks we own. NOt gigs of photo's. But mere bytes lost, without any possible justificatin and it's not our fault.



You see yahoo is still in business and will suffer disgrace for there lack of grace. The law hasn't advanced to deter there conduct but it will.



Companies we trust who are still accountable can't get away with shutting in a day, or a day earlier then they say even! Yahoo still has income, some assets. We would rather have OUR data then your shares. But those who blame us, who pretend to scratch thereh heads like they don't get it, ignore the facts. Yahoo was our only, not merely primary backup. Yes. To suggest just because we don't own a PC for whatevr reason, don't carry it around all the time, don't waste most of the time on it and our lives, as is implied, we shoudl suffer, shouldnt' be made whole, shouldnt' get what files can be obtained regardlress of the expense, is silly.



I call foro a correction the the claim in this article that yahoo gave months to users. THEY DID NOT! THEY said "3/30th/2009 TUESDAY" and that date has not yet occured. They said after it we would not be timely. We who trusted tried getgting our files on taht MONDAY and regardless of what time we would of finished it was too late.



Yet they returned one persons files who reached them after that date- well after, just recently in fact did they mail the cd.



Grace? PCW check your facts! It was as if the retaliation started by wanting to rob us of our files they had stored in many cases for a decade without making a cent off of us. Or frankly spending much more then that if anything. The claims about how storage is cheap do not defend the shutters. They in fact support those of us who thought they are not going to lose other peoples data because they can't articulate a deadline clearly or accurately. They will store the megs for another day at least and even alllow downloads during that day or longer.



Because they own the servers and it costs almost nothing to spin them per 20 megs.



We pay attention to solvency. We sometimes knew the law. Yahoo is we have learned suffering the wrath of sore losing last year and trying to show how

the judges got it wrong when they said there promise isn't accompanied by a fingers crossed all the time so it doesn't matter what they say. They are trying to sacrifice our property so as to not create expectations about it but they have taken teh fifth too late in this sick crime spree.



Yes we trusted. We believed yahoo would conduct itself liek this with less likelyhod then our house and that of our friend not existing.



Those who insgtead save a cd here adn there are the fools. Storing data that only has value if we live and remember the username and password has no substitute in security to storing it only once, and online. This point is entirely ignored. IN some cases moving such a file to another nontracable location required a lot of research. But mainly we lacked time and wanted to give yahoo a chacne to extend the date and provide better tools if nto to reconsider the shutdown altoagether.



THey even took money from us like kodack does. FOr many of us for years. Then they in less then 60 days stole our property. Even if we had just paid for another year!



Even if you are still in print you are no journalist. It's about exploitation not folly. About it being a jungle and nobody caring yet not about the hunted being obblivious.



So there is no way 'we' can avoid such abuse. It's the abuse itself that must be stopped. Most of the victims are ashamed and already blaming themselves. Wrongfully. Yahoo has made money off of our trust. Most of it has been spent. Too bad as they now owe more then they have grossed. WIth ability to pay

enough for it to be worth collecting on. To those who can't collect anything I have sympathy sure. But to those who don't give a dam about ideas, even there own, about history, about how this is the modern equivalent of burning a library just without the smoke and ashes.



Cheer the bonfire on. It's only knowledge. Only progress. What matters is showing off how many adds for drives you've gotten excitted about. Burn the books.



The world is already too good let's make it worse.



Documents unguarded should be made to vanish whenever possible. Myth mustu be cherised at the cost of any truth. Facts cause problems made to fiction doesn't. Original, unique work must not be left in the hands of the poor no matter what.



The data doesn't dissappear. It gets written over. Deliberately. Criminally. FOr how many more months or years before society stops this hemorhage of wisdom possibly necessary to prevent extinction?



The president wants someone who has compassion. I agree. Trusting is the right thing to do- if betrayed blame the betrayer. Stop others from so betraying. This can be the history of jursiprudence ever so much so. Or not. Those within yahoo etc. who authorised the denial of attempts to get content entrusted to them back are as clueless as any I have ever heard of being in sucha position of awesome power and responsibility to the entire planet and beyond.



They had the delete button in there hands perhaps. But no right to use it. Our society is built on that concept. It's what makes it safe to fly. We took less of a risk

in using online storage then anyone who drives a mile. Sometimes risks howevr slight and justifiable burn the risker. When that happens only the sociopath says well it won't happen twice and contniues on there way or figures out how to stay away from that fire when no one not yet burned will.



So I join with the other comment here to say shame. It's about the right to trust, the duty to trust. Even Obama says we have no right to privacy. Oh really?



It is up to us. Our property, our privacy, our contracts. Ignored- sure, so far. But hope doesn't heal as much as it prevents. So we hope yahoo has a copy they have not yet burnt. But as long as nobody knows our fear grows. The service you use of there's may very well come at the expense of more then our tears.

[LHart]

In Response to RNR19952...

5000 CHEERS for YOU, SIR!!! There are just too many alternatives to 'Online Data Storage': CD/RWs; DVDs and Dual-Layer DVDs; USB Flash Drives; External Tape Drives; External Zip Drives; External Hard Drives, and, probably a few that I haven't yet heard of. Yes, TOO MANY VIABLE ALTERNAITIVES to trusting your Data to total strangers! It would seem that most people assume the inherent honesty of anyone employed by a legitimate site, and that's just plain tomfoolery!
It's great to see that others share my convictions that Online Storage is just , plain, dangerous!