Gadgets and VoIP

Security Problem at DropBox

Security Problem at DropBox

I love DropBox and use it daily, usually several times a day. I have also written often about the need for online security so I was disappointed to read that DropBox had a major security problem yesterday. The company installed a software update and nearly four hours later discovered that  anyone could log into any DropBox account without a password. As soon as the problem was discovered, the company reverted back to the previous software version and tested the process heavily. For those four hours, anyone who was aware of the glitch could have accessed your data stored on the DropBox servers without restriction. Details may be found at http://goo.gl/wdJuM.

While inexcusable, the problem isn't rare. Errors will happen anywhere. This problem happened at DropBox but it could have happened most anyplace else.

The quick reaction will  always be, "I won't give my data to anyone. I'll keep it safe and secure on my own hard drive." Of course, that is about as effective as an ostrich sticking its head in the sand. In fact, data stored on your own computer's hard drive is probably as much at risk or even more at risk than data stored on a remote online service.

Update: Apple Creates Its Own Cloud

As predicted last week, Apple CEO Steve Jobs today announced the official release of a new digital storage and syncing service, called iCloud, at Apple's annual Worldwide Developer's Conference. The new service is not a general-purpose cloud to compete with Amazon's S3 or Rackspace's cloud services that allow customers to configure servers and run applications in the cloud. Instead, the iCloud service is restricted mostly to data storage and is customized to integrate with several products found on Apple's handheld computers as well as on desktop and laptop systems. A few of the new services will also work with iTunes on Windows.

Apple's iCloud appears to be a modern service designed to replace the aging and over-priced old cloud service, called MobileMe.

Consumers, Cloud Data, and Privacy

I am a big fan of cloud computing and I use it for several tasks. All of my email is "in the cloud" as are my finances, income taxes, online banking, my genealogy database, my personal calendar, and some of my word processing for articles to be published later in this newsletter. You can read my earlier Computing in the Clouds article at http://blog.eogn.com/eastmans_online_genealogy/2009/03/computing-in-the-clouds.html and Why Cloud Computing Makes Sense for Genealogy article at http://blog.eogn.com/eastmans_online_genealogy/2009/07/why-cloud-computing-makes-sense-for-genealogy.html.

While I continue to be a big fan of cloud computing, I will also be the first to tell you that all is not perfect with this new technology. Cloud computing could have security issues. I believe the risk is small and manageable, but security issues certainly should not be ignored. Ars Techina has a nice article about the FTC's concern that consumers don't understand the implications of storing their data in the cloud. From the article: