Dropbox exposes personal details of viewers of publicly shared Paper documents • Hacker News Board

Re: Dropbox exposes personal details of viewers of publicly shared Paper documents

#31

Post by giancarlostoro » Thu, Sep 26, 2019, 2:17 PM UTC

neogodless wrote: post #30

giancarlostoro wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd be OK with just part of their email or something, or only first or last name (but never both, or switched). It should only be 1 bit of information that if it looks off it would alert someone that the link has been compromised. On the other hand I feel like Google Docs does the same thing.

I believe the way Google Docs works is that if you share something publicly, people show up as "Anonymous Animal" and that's about the limit of what you can learn about them, unless they are on the same G Suite account with you. Although I think you might have the option to "reveal your Google Account" to other users/viewers of the shared document.

Yeah that's what I meant, I've seen names on documents, didn't know the specifics of how they got there. All without logging on.

Re: Dropbox exposes personal details of viewers of publicly shared Paper documents

#32

Post by y4mi » Thu, Sep 26, 2019, 2:17 PM UTC

abtinf wrote: post #26

plg wrote: post #22

Man alive, all I want is a folder that syncs. That's all. I understand that Dropbox is a business and blah blah blah ... so what are my alternatives if I literally only want: - a folder that syncs on my devices - the ability to share a folder with others - cross-platform

Keybase. I really wish they would get their act together and let me pay them for the service.

They're really looking like they've got laser focus on file sync with their crypto wallet support and random crap coin giveaways

Re: Dropbox exposes personal details of viewers of publicly shared Paper documents

#33

Post by jasonsync » Thu, Sep 26, 2019, 2:19 PM UTC

plg wrote: post #22

Man alive, all I want is a folder that syncs. That's all. I understand that Dropbox is a business and blah blah blah ... so what are my alternatives if I literally only want: - a folder that syncs on my devices - the ability to share a folder with others - cross-platform

https://www.Sync.com (full disclosure, I work there).

Re: Dropbox exposes personal details of viewers of publicly shared Paper documents

#34

Post by wereHamster » Thu, Sep 26, 2019, 2:21 PM UTC

plg wrote: post #22

Man alive, all I want is a folder that syncs. That's all. I understand that Dropbox is a business and blah blah blah ... so what are my alternatives if I literally only want: - a folder that syncs on my devices - the ability to share a folder with others - cross-platform

I use Resilio Sync. It's not free, but was just a one time payment, not a subscription. Works on macOS, Linux, Windows, and they have an iOS app, too.

Sharing with others is possible, but they have to have the app installed to access the files. Resilion Sync doesn't provide any server through which you can download the files, it's all P2P.

Re: Dropbox exposes personal details of viewers of publicly shared Paper documents

#35

Post by andmarios » Thu, Sep 26, 2019, 2:21 PM UTC

plg wrote: post #22

Man alive, all I want is a folder that syncs. That's all. I understand that Dropbox is a business and blah blah blah ... so what are my alternatives if I literally only want: - a folder that syncs on my devices - the ability to share a folder with others - cross-platform

Syncthing. No cloud part though.

Re: Dropbox exposes personal details of viewers of publicly shared Paper documents

#36

Post by pedroaraujo » Thu, Sep 26, 2019, 2:24 PM UTC

plg wrote: post #22

Man alive, all I want is a folder that syncs. That's all. I understand that Dropbox is a business and blah blah blah ... so what are my alternatives if I literally only want: - a folder that syncs on my devices - the ability to share a folder with others - cross-platform

I know that people will frown at this for being Chinese but I really recommend Seafile:

- https://www.seafile.com/en/home/

It's pretty much an open-source version of Dropbox. It works incredibly well, you can host it yourself and does what you expect you to do.

Re: Dropbox exposes personal details of viewers of publicly shared Paper documents

#37

Post by josteink » Thu, Sep 26, 2019, 2:28 PM UTC

52-6F-62 wrote: post #29

plg wrote: post #22

Man alive, all I want is a folder that syncs. That's all. I understand that Dropbox is a business and blah blah blah ... so what are my alternatives if I literally only want: - a folder that syncs on my devices - the ability to share a folder with others - cross-platform

Does any viable open-source option exist that could be self-hosted?

Nextcloud. Has windows, Linux and iOS clients.

Also integrates with Files on iOS, and has camera-upload which works better than Dropbox.

Best switch I ever made.

Re: Dropbox exposes personal details of viewers of publicly shared Paper documents

#38

Post by marcinzm » Thu, Sep 26, 2019, 2:29 PM UTC

I just created a Paper document on my Dropbox account and then viewed it on another account. As best I can tell, Dropbox saying there is a notification is a lie.

I did not get a visible notification when creating it although there may have been one buried under some links or button. Paper documents are publicly editable by default if you have the url.

I got no notification when viewing it from a different user. I used the public link to do so and could see the identities of other viewers.

Re: Dropbox exposes personal details of viewers of publicly shared Paper documents

#39

Post by swebs » Thu, Sep 26, 2019, 2:32 PM UTC

plg wrote: post #22

Man alive, all I want is a folder that syncs. That's all. I understand that Dropbox is a business and blah blah blah ... so what are my alternatives if I literally only want: - a folder that syncs on my devices - the ability to share a folder with others - cross-platform

I've been using Nextcloud for a few years and it's great. The catch is that it's self-hosted so you'll have to get a VPS or have a Raspberry Pi lying around that you want to use for it. Setting up the server takes about 10 minutes if you're a technical user. It's just "sudo snap install Nextcloud" then some additional LetsEncrypt settings if you want SSL. I'll admit it's not a good solution for non-technical users who aren't familiar with the command line.

However, multiple users can use the same server, so you can set it up once and share it with family members. You (the server admin) have full control over your data, so it won't be parsed and collected by third parties. It's also FOSS. There exist sync clients for all desktop and smartphone operating systems as well as a web interface for everything else.

https://nextcloud.com/

Re: Dropbox exposes personal details of viewers of publicly shared Paper documents

#40

Post by kop316 » Thu, Sep 26, 2019, 2:36 PM UTC

martin_a wrote: post #24

plg wrote: post #22

Man alive, all I want is a folder that syncs. That's all. I understand that Dropbox is a business and blah blah blah ... so what are my alternatives if I literally only want: - a folder that syncs on my devices - the ability to share a folder with others - cross-platform

Maybe something like a self-hosted NextCloud/OwnCloud? Although integration into the operating systems is not as good as with Dropbox, I completely switched to a self-hosted NextCloud and everything works fine without bloat.

+1 on the Nextcloud. It hosts files great and completely replaced Dropbox. It also hosts my Contacts, Calendar, and with Collabra, it is a complete Google Docs replacement too. Like someone else said further down, it also does automatic picture uploads too.