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Dropbox Attempts To Kill Open Source Project

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Re: Dropbox Attempts To Kill Open Source Project

#51

Post by argos »

tghw wrote: post #40
arashf wrote: post #21

This is Arash from Dropbox. We removed the ability to share the project source code because it enables communications with our servers in a manner that is a violation of our Terms of Service. By our TOS, we reserve the right to terminate the account of users in this case. However, we chose to remove access to the file instead of terminating the account of the user. We recently built a tool that allows us to ban links…

Would you mind highlighting what part of the ToS this sort of thing violates?

yeah, one thing is to use the code on drop box servers... I could understand the ToS violation in that case.... but having the code is a violation?

Re: Dropbox Attempts To Kill Open Source Project

#52

Post by power78 »

yid wrote: post #38
arashf wrote: post #21

This is Arash from Dropbox. We removed the ability to share the project source code because it enables communications with our servers in a manner that is a violation of our Terms of Service. By our TOS, we reserve the right to terminate the account of users in this case. However, we chose to remove access to the file instead of terminating the account of the user. We recently built a tool that allows us to ban links…

Hi Arash, I find it hard to believe that you did not anticipate exactly this happening when designing (a) an online file backup service, (b) a "de"-duplication algorithm. That said, you should have planned for exactly this a long time ago, whether by the means DropShip used, or any of several other potential file sharing hacks. I think a lot of us here are disappointed with how your actions reflect that planning, or…

I agree. I actually proposed this idea a while back but never went through with the implementation. I hope Dropbox turns a blind eye to this because I think its fair use of Dropbox. Instead of someone sending you the file and then you adding it to Dropbox manually, you can just send the hash for the file and receive without P2P. This is where the world of online storage might head anyways.

Re: Dropbox Attempts To Kill Open Source Project

#53

Post by cmatthias »

parfe wrote: post #47
cmatthias wrote: post #3

Wow, did not expect this from a savvy company like Dropbox. Filing a fake DMCA complaint? I think I'll take my files elsewhere.

No you won't, but it feels good to grand stand.

I already deleted it. I'm not sure how I can prove it to you as I didn't get an email, and when I clicked the "Delete Account" button to commit to deleting my account it just bounced me to the dropbox homepage. But thanks for trying to call me out.

Re: Dropbox Attempts To Kill Open Source Project

#54

Post by judofyr »

staunch wrote: post #50

Is there anything Dropbox can do to prevent this de-dupe hack?

Sure: When the client has created a hashsum of the file and sent it to the server, the server can respond with a challenge: "What's the SHA1 of the bytes between X and Y" (where X and Y are random numbers). This is something both parts can easily compute and the client must have the whole file in order to answer the challenge.

Re: Dropbox Attempts To Kill Open Source Project

#55

Post by lukeschlather »

arashf wrote: post #30
reynolds wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I personally feel that Dropbox removing files from someone's account is completely wrong, regardless of your ToS. Your service is there to backup files. When you delete references to files from someone else's accounts, you're violating the trust that people put in your service.

We didn't remove the file - we simply banned public access to it.

Despite that, I'm reading your terms of service, and it sounds to me like you reserve the right to terminate service (which sounds like it would include deleting files) with or without notice, if you deem there has been a sufficiently egregious violation of your ToS.

Is that accurate?

Re: Dropbox Attempts To Kill Open Source Project

#56

Post by shasta »

Dropbox has a simple technical recourse to prevent de-duplication from being used for file sharing - issue a random challenge (a slightly more sophisticated version of "ok, what is the 100th word in the file?") before acknowledging a collision as a true duplicate.

Edit: Thinking about this a bit more, the primary expense of this scheme would probably be accessing the file to verify the challenge results. Here's a question: is there a cryptographic scheme which would allow responses to some form of challenge to be verified using a relatively small key (32 or 64 bytes would be nice), but for which it isn't feasible to rebuild the key given a few thousand sample challenges?

Re: Dropbox Attempts To Kill Open Source Project

#57

Post by mncolinlee »

ugh wrote: post #28

Understandable. Dropbox doesn't want to become a piracy website. Using a DMCA takedown request was a stupid way of dealing with the issue, though.

Why does everyone make the assumption that torrents and services like Dropship must be used for piracy? Major video game companies use torrents all the time to distribute patches and betas.

A knife can be used to commit murder, but most often it is simply used to cut food. The problem with the way DMCA works is that it bars the development of new technologies because one of many uses could be harmful. The law stifles innovation when used this way.

Re: Dropbox Attempts To Kill Open Source Project

#58

Post by wewyor »

shad0wfax wrote: post #44

Strike 2, dropbox

What was strike 1?

I can understand them not wanting the files to be public, but as tptacek said this is probably fluffed up quite a bit.

As far as I'm concerned the only issue with how they handled it is the DMCA takedown request, and if the CTO acted as said but that is less of a factor.

If the files were never removed from the persons dropbox and only public urls disabled I'm okay with that. However if the files were removed I would probably count that as all three strikes and jump ship.

Re: Dropbox Attempts To Kill Open Source Project

#59

Post by runjake »

amock wrote: post #37
adamhowell wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well that makes one of us who can live without Dropbox. Drew would have to kill a baby panda with an elephant tusk for me to even begin thinking about switching.

Do you need Dropbox or just something like it? Dropbox doesn't seem to have very strong network effects so it seems like it would be easy to replace with a similar product. If you're willing to give up features that require hashes to be shared across accounts you could even have a secure replacement with client side encryption.

Your comment would've been much more helpful had you provided said alternatives.

Re: Dropbox Attempts To Kill Open Source Project

#60

Post by anotherjesse »

tptacek wrote: post #41

Consider that maybe what's happening here is boring. Recognize that we all have a cognitive bias towards narratives, and especially interesting narratives. The discussion on this story is trying to build a narrative about Dropbox vs. open source developers. The real story is probably not that interesting. The CTO of a service as technically interesting as Dropbox certainly knows that he can't prevent the disclosure o…

Understandable except the assertion of filing a dmca because he thinks that the reposts of code are "geek rage". The DMCA provides that you may be liable for damages (including costs and attorneys fees) if you falsely claim that an item is infringing your copyrights.

Using this powerful law as a scare tactic isn't acceptable. If you wish to claim that the code was infact infringing, then the conversation is different.

This seems to be:

* illegal use of dmca by dropbox * dropbox says dropship using reverse engineered sync protocol broke anti-circumvention techniques or contains their copyright

Either of which are bold statments

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