China based Giant Cloud storage service '360' dies!

[drjd]

One of the largest cloud webspace provider of China, 360 Yunpan, offering a whopping 36 TB webspace free to its users for a lifetime is closing its services unexpectedly. I think there is was no comparison of free cloud space available in the global village. I have been a user of their services since last few years and have really appreciated the webspace and upload bandwidth they allowed to a free user.

According to a notice received today, https://yunpan.360.cn sent to it's VIP members (? ), they are shutting down their upload services to their servers from November 1, 2016 onwards, and advised their members to download all their data back before February 1, 2017. After the date, they will no longer retain cloud disk data, close all the cloud accounts and empty the data on their servers. They have already stopped the thumbnail preview and play online video functions from October 20, 2016! They are closing down because "Some criminals use 360 ​​cloud disk storage...", they think.

Thankfully enough, they have declared a refund to their existing premium members. Google translation of their notice (originally in Chinese) is given below:

Spoiler:

Current criminals use 360 ​​cloud disk storage and dissemination of illegal documents, infringement and piracy profit, dissemination of pornographic information and other illegal and criminal acts occur frequently, serious infringement of the legitimate rights and interests of legitimate enterprises, but also to the community has brought great harm.
In recent years, 360 cloud disk has always strictly abide by the requirements of Internet laws and regulations, continue to invest a lot of manpower and resources and technical resources, crack down on illegal acts. However, due to the cloud disk storage privacy, management complexity, still make enterprises face huge security risks.
Therefore, the 360 ​​cloud disk decided to stop personal cloud disk service, network disk storage, dissemination of content legitimacy and security are completely resolved before the recovery is no longer considered, after the transformation of enterprise cloud services.
We are about to take the following measures:
October 20, 2016 to February 1, 2017 members of the refund. Is still a member of the user status, regardless of the number of days remaining, are full refund;
November 1, 2016 to stop the cloud disk upload services, including upload, transfer and other data write functions are turned off;
February 1, 2017 will no longer retain cloud disk data, close all cloud account and clear the data, be sure to download the backup data before.
We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused, and appreciate your stay.
360 cloud disk
October 20, 2016
Frequently Asked Questions:
1.360 cloud why the transition to close?
Some criminals use 360 ​​cloud disk storage and dissemination of illegal documents, infringement and piracy profit, dissemination of pornographic information and other illegal and criminal acts occur frequently, serious infringement of legitimate business legitimate rights and interests, but also to the community has brought great harm in the absence of security Solution to these problems before the decision to stop the cloud version of Personal Edition services.
2. Cloud disk service when shutting down?
October 20, 2016 announcement, close the online play video, preview the file, view the thumbnail function. November 1, 2016 to stop the cloud disk upload services, including upload, transfer and other data write functions are closed; February 1, 2017 will no longer retain cloud disk data, close all the cloud account and empty the data, Please be sure to download the backup data before this date.
3. How long does the download transfer data take?
From now until January 31, 2017 can be downloaded during the backup data, since February 1, 2017 to close the cloud disk service, please download and backup data.
4. How do my original members apply for a refund?
Users who are still in the membership period after October 20, 2016 will be fully refunded: Users who purchased within the past 3 months will be automatically refunded through the original purchase channel; users who purchase or purchase goods through Apple's products channels for more than 3 months , Need to manually record in the official website member https://yunpan.360.cn/my?p=vip or kefu@360.cn customer service mailbox for a refund; please apply before February 1, 2017, expired no longer accept the refund Application.
5. How long can I apply for a refund?
Automatic refund will be automatically returned through the original purchase channels will be 1-3 days to return to the original payment account; manual application requires bulk collection of refund information, then submit to the company approval to go through the financial payment process is expected to take 2-3 weeks.
6. Cloud U disk in the data can be saved?
No, cloud U disk is the use of cloud disk data, affected by the transformation of cloud disk, you need to download and backup at the same time.
7, and cloud disk services can continue to use it?
Specific types of cooperation services, please pay attention to the official announcement of the service in time for the next step.

I feel it is a serious setback in the cloud market, and needs to be discussed further while determining the reliability level of cloud space providers.

[cromag]

I have never fully trusted the cloud. I use a few services, staying at the "free" level, but not for back-up or critical storage. I use Dropbox because it integrates nicely with my Android phone and other devices, especially for cell phone photos. I use Google Drive to exchange files among my Chromebook, Windows and Linux computers, etc.

But I (quickly!) make physical back-ups on flash drives, external hard disks and CD-ROMs.

My first experience with a cloud service shutting down was with Ubuntu One. Again, I didn't panic because I already had local copies of everything I had in the "cloud."

[HarryT]

Sounds as if they had an unsustainable business model. I work for a company which is (very) big in the area of Cloud services, and you need huge investment to provide the level of performance and resilience which customers expect these days.

[344a]

Their announcement said, they can't control and stop the piracy of all the copyright material in their cloud services, they need to shut it down.
In China, you never know what is the deal behind. It could be because of political things going on behind, and very likely too. Don't forget, China is making a lot of money on piracy, and they don't care copyright.

I have a free Dropbox account, but I have never considered it a means of safe storage, or really storage at all. I just use it as a means to transfer files from one device to another from where ever Internet access is available. File only need remain "in the cloud" long enough for that.

Originally Posted by 344a

Their announcement said, they can't control and stop the piracy of all the copyright material in their cloud services, they need to shut it down.
In China, you never know what is the deal behind. It could be because of political things going on behind, and very likely too. Don't forget, China is making a lot of money on piracy, and they don't care copyright.

Yes, a service controlled by the Chinese government would strike me as a very leaky vessel to store ones information in.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by Hamlet53

I have a free Dropbox account, but I have never considered it a means of safe storage, or really storage at all. I just use it as a means to transfer files from one device to another from where ever Internet access is available. File only need remain "in the cloud" long enough for that.

Reputable Cloud services are as secure and resilient as any storage method you'll find anywhere, and the providers of such services spend huge amounts of money on data centres to make them that way.

"Free" Cloud services are worth precisely what you pay for them.

[Sirtel]

I use OneDrive and SugarSync for back-up, but I make back-ups on external hard disks too. The best of both worlds. I would never rely solely on a cloud provider, but I would not want to rely only on local copies either (what if a burglar breaks into my apartment or there's a fire?)

[Josieb1]

We pay for Dropbox Pro and TBH we have far more storage available than we actually use. Even calibre is in Dropbox. But, we have all our folders held locally on either of our two PCs, nothing is held only in the cloud, also the entire Dropbox folder is regularly backed up to multiple external drives.

We use it (and happily pay for it) as its convenient and useful. We have multiple PC's tablets and phones which can all access every file we have at a moments notice.

[tubemonkey]

I use free cloud services for audiobooks and music. Even then, they're only copies of copies and only a small portion of what I own. I use it for devices that don't have external storage capability.

[leebase]

One of the advantages of actually paying for your services...the companies can stay in business to continue providing them. What business model could succeed with 36tb of free storage for everybody? And of COURSE people would use such space for illegal file sharing.

I still have my free dropbox....I was bumping into the limits and was going to start paying...but after a review of the alternatives, I went with Office365.

For the price of dropbox alone ($100 for 1tb), I get family Office with 5 accounts of one drive with 1tb for each. for that same price. Oh....and 5 licenses for Office on computers, five for office on tables, and 5 online office accounts

[GERGE]

I host my own services on DigitalOcean with Seafile. I am happy.

[Josieb1]

Originally Posted by leebase

I still have my free dropbox....I was bumping into the limits and was going to start paying...but after a review of the alternatives, I went with Office365.

For the price of dropbox alone ($100 for 1tb), I get family Office with 5 accounts of one drive with 1tb for each. for that same price. Oh....and 5 licenses for Office on computers, five for office on tables, and 5 online office accounts

That's the decision we need to make next year. How do you find Onedrive compared to Dropbox. We have iPads, iPhones, a Mac, Windows PCs and an Android tablet. I'm just dubious of moving everything to Onedrive.

[Fiat_Lux]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Sounds as if they had an unsustainable business model.

Cloud storage solutions are in bind.

To keep the price attractive to customers, it has to cost less than drives from NewEgg, but to keep the lights on, the customer, over the course of a year, needs to pay roughly twice the cost of a drive from NewEgg.

With the customer paying nothing, alternate revenue streams have to generate a lot of money. Advertising being the obvious one. Rewards from Investigative Consultants being the unobvious one.

My guess is that Yuan360 wasn't generating enough revenue from those Investigative Consultants.

Those Investigative Consultants are also the reason why using any cloud based storage solution is an incredibly bad idea.

Amber

[HarryT]

Sorry, what are "investigative consultants", please?

I must respectfully disagree with your assertion that Cloud storage has to cost less than a cheap drive in order to be commercially viable. The primary market for Cloud storage is the large corporate market, not the individual. For companies, Cloud storage simply has to be attractively priced compared to the cost of provisioning and operating their own data centre.

[cfrizz]

Sorry, but no sympathy from me. Storage is cheap now a days, If you are careless enough to leave your documents in the cloud, when the cloud disappears taking your docs with it, that's what you get for taking the easy/cheap way out.

Clouds move, shift and disappear, whether in the sky or on the Web. If you want to rely on something that isn't guaranteed to stick around and not under YOUR control, then you deserve whatever you get!