![]() ![]() There’s a docker container for it, and I expect to see a Bitnami kit for it soon both are one-button deployments. I will admit that this isn’t a system that your grandmother could put together, however it isn’t as difficult as you might think the pieces that you need (Linux server, firewall, RAID array) have become very easy for someone with just a little technical knowledge to set up. The network itself is as secure as I can manage, and I use several automated tools to monitor and manage security, especially around the cloud system. The Seafile client runs on any platform, and so my files are always in sync no matter which device (desktop, phone, tablet) I pick up. My files are under my control, on a machine that I built, using software that I inspected, and encrypted with my own secure keys. My solution was to build my own personal cloud using Seafile, an open-source cloud server, running on my own Linux-based RAID storage system. I do, though, want the convenience of cloud storage. I don’t trust anyone with my data except myself. Odds are that Microsoft and Google and Apple will be in business (though we’ve seen large companies fail before), but what about Dropbox? Box? Evernote? When you store files on any company’s servers, you are trusting that they will still be in business in the future. And….they’re goneĪnother trust issue that isn’t brought up much is whether or not the company you are using now to store your files will still be around in a few years. Given that assumption, if you choose to use a commercial cloud service, the very least you should do is encrypt your files locally and only store the encrypted versions on the cloud. You should assume that any file you store on someone else’s server can be read by someone else. I believe that Apple is working on a solution in which they haven no knowledge of the encryption key. However, it’s my understanding that the files are currently encrypted with Apple’s keys, which are subject to FISA warrants. ![]() Some services are better than others about this Apple says that files are encrypted in transit and at rest on their iCould servers. Warrants, in the form of National Security Letters, come with a gag order and so you will not be told when an agency has requested to see your files. ![]() That means that if the key is compromised or a law-enforcement or spy agency wants to see what’s in the file, the cloud service will decrypt your file for them and turn it over. In most cases, if the file is encrypted, it is with the cloud service’s key, not yours. Most cloud services will encrypt the transmission of your file from your computer to theirs, however when the file is at rest on their servers, it might or might not be encrypted, depending on the company. It’s why you start seeing ads for vacations when you send your mom an email about an upcoming trip. You agreed to this when you signed up for the service. There’s nothing nefarious about this Google is basically an ad agency, and well over half of their revenue is made by selling access to their profiles of each user, which are built by combining search history, emails, and the contents of our documents on their cloud. However, as I point out to my students, if they bothered to read the terms of service when they signed up, they know that they are giving permission to Google to scan, index, compile, profile, and otherwise read through the documents that are stored on the Google cloud. Google is a household name and most people trust them implicitly. It’s free, easy to use, and well integrated into a lot of third-party tools. All of them have the same business model: “Trust us with your data.”īut that’s not the pitch, which is, “Wouldn’t you like to have access to your files from any device?”Ī large majority of my students use Google Docs for cloud storage. In the past four or five years the number of online file storage services (collectively ‘the cloud’) went from zero to more than I can name. I think that trust is the single most important commodity on the internet, and the one that is least thought about. If you aren’t paying for it, you are the product Tl dr: I don’t trust anyone with my data except myself, and neither should you. You can see the entire list in the first post. This post is part of a series on technologies that I’m currently using for privacy, and my reasons for them. January 9th, 2017 in privacy, security, Tools 0 comments ![]()
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