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Google Drive may restrict files identified as violating ToS

workspaceupdates.googleblog.com

131–140 of 269 posts

Re: Google Drive may restrict files identified as violating ToS

#131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple's CSAM would scan your offline photos. Google scanning photos you upload to their cloud seems fine to me. Not a slippery slope.

> " Apple's CSAM would scan your offline photos. " No it wouldn't. It would only scan photos you upload to their cloud. "This feature only impacts users who have chosen to use iCloud Photos to store their photos. It does not impact users who have not chosen to use iCloud Photos. There is no impact to any other on-device data." and "Does this mean Apple is going to scan all the photos stored on my iPhone? No. By desig…

You're right - I misremembered. Kinda wish HN would let me edit.

Re: Google Drive may restrict files identified as violating ToS

#132

Perhaps one should encrypt files before uploading to cloud services. Sure it destroys the possibility of webview for your data, but then you don't have to worry about situations like this.

I've been using rclone+restic to back up files to my university-provided Google Drive, which has unlimited storage. Apart from occasional "rate limit exceeded API warnings", I haven't faced any issues so far. Wonder if that'll change with the new policy.

Re: Google Drive may restrict files identified as violating ToS

#133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is an issue that none of the cloud providers have solved. I had 250,000 CD rips from various record labels at one point. I had full authorization from them, but it looks like I'm a massive pirate.

It should look like you're a massive pirate -- if you have hundreds of people downloading those CD rips from your Gdrive. If you're the only one accessing your own files, it shouldn't matter how many rips you have. Don't know how it works in practice.

To clarify, this was not a shared folder.

Re: Google Drive may restrict files identified as violating ToS

#134
post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Big tech has been rolling out censorship all over the place lately. People suspect that ulterior political motives are causing Google to do this. I don't think mistrusting the motives of Google means that the people here lack "reading skills and critical thinking." One of the terms included in its abuse policies is "hate speech." This is an extraordinarily ambiguous word which can virtually apply to any speech that i…

9/10 with one demerit for omitting the compulsory "wake up, sheeple".

“The British are coming!” -- Paul Revere

"Put a sock in it, ya wanker." -- You in 1775, probably.

Re: Google Drive may restrict files identified as violating ToS

#135
post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only thing that changed was that there's now a notification sent to the user if the sharing of a file is restricted. Why is that deeply disturbing news? Seems like a strict improvement in usability.

What is disturbing is the reason they give for why they will do it. One thing is if the drive is specifically used for cyber attacks and other malicious operations over the internet, but they refer to these rules; https://support.google.com/docs/answer/148505 and they are extensive to say the least. On top of that this is yet another move from Google to declare their rights to control your content and access to it if…

sorry, maybe I misread your question. Did you mean to say that they already did this without any notice to users, and the only change now is that they will start to send notifications when they do?

Re: Google Drive may restrict files identified as violating ToS

#136
post #2

Google says you can request a review if you believe something should not have been flagged as a ToS violation but no mention is given to any rights you have. To me this reads as "You can request whatever you want but it might not mean anything in reality.": https://support.google.com/docs/answer/2463328 Conversely, the information for how to report what you perceive as a ToS violation is far more complete: https://su…

Considering their history with falsely-flagged videos on YouTube, I assume this to be "you can ask for a review but we're not gonna do anything about it lol".

Re: Google Drive may restrict files identified as violating ToS

#137
post #68
post #9

I don't quite grasp the panic about this: my impression is Google currently restricts ToS violations from sharing (your own access is retained). The only change here is end-users will be explicitly notified (and can theoretically contest the decision).

The panic is people's fear of the Iron Heel[1]. For most of us, the systems we depend on are controlled by other people. In this chaotic political climate, when these systems start closing in on us, or restricting us in new ways, there's no way of knowing where the tightening will end. Some are incredibly insulated and have no worries about the kind of world we're living in, but others are constantly on edge and feel…

Otherwise known as the slippery slope logical fallacy

Re: Google Drive may restrict files identified as violating ToS

#138

Note that you can still access your files, they are not blocking that or restricting that. Its the sharing that's blocked.

But seriously how long is it before Google implements a hashing algorithm (not too dissimilar from Apple's) to check if a user has not uploaded content with a copyright on it and taking some form of action on the user. This feels like a slippery slope to be on.

No post body was provided.

Re: Google Drive may restrict files identified as violating ToS

#139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple's CSAM would scan your offline photos. Google scanning photos you upload to their cloud seems fine to me. Not a slippery slope.

> " Apple's CSAM would scan your offline photos. " No it wouldn't. It would only scan photos you upload to their cloud. "This feature only impacts users who have chosen to use iCloud Photos to store their photos. It does not impact users who have not chosen to use iCloud Photos. There is no impact to any other on-device data." and "Does this mean Apple is going to scan all the photos stored on my iPhone? No. By desig…

You are spreading misinformation. I don’t know if on purpose or ignorance.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/child-sexual-abuse-scans-apple-...

They were very much planning to scan all photos on the device independent of iCloud. It was going to be another phase of the rollout. It was going to be in iOS 15.x and they backpedaled.

Re: Google Drive may restrict files identified as violating ToS

#140
post #129
post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my country that would be almost certainly illegal. Not even copyright holders can tell you what you can do with your personal copies of copyrighted works, short of distributing them to someone else. By law they're explicitly prevented from doing that.

The cloud is "someone else".

Not necessarily for the purpose of our copyright act. Neither is your personal bank deposit box if you put a book in it. You're not transferring ownership of your belongings to the bank if you put something in it.
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