- Google Drive files vanish
- Sync issue investigation ongoing
- User data loss concerns
Users have been notified that months’ private files have been removed from certain Google Drive accounts.
According to reports on Google’s support forums, dozens of files have mysteriously disappeared from personal accounts.
Google has confirmed several Google Drive desktop users were experiencing a “sync issue.” The precise origins of the problem remain undisclosed at this time.
Avoid modifying any app data and refrain from selecting the ‘Disconnect Account’ option within the application if you discover that files are absent.
Additionally, Google has advised users to create local backups of their application data while investigating the matter.
User Complaints and Concerns
Yeon Joong, a Google Drive user from Korea, initially brought attention to the matter through a post on the Google Drive Help Community page.
All of their files dating back to May of this year had been removed from their Google Drive, Joong explained in their post.
Joong stated, “I utilised the drive a few days ago, and this terrible issue occurred last morning.”
They further stated, “The incident was absolutely devastating, and the files are vital to me.”
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The issue has been formally acknowledged in a response authored by Saitej, a Google employee speaking on behalf of the Google Drive team.
Saitej stated, “We are conducting an investigation into reports of a problem affecting a restricted subset of Drive for desktop users and will provide further updates.”
Until then, the Google employee advised Drive users against deleting or relocating the app data location and turning off the ‘Disconnect Account’ option.
User Outcry and Support Staff Response
Additionally, they advised, “If you have space on your hard drive, you should duplicate the application data folder.”
Today, two hundred seventy-four users have selected “I have the same question” in response to the original post.
Several users supplemented the comments with their grievances, stating that files had also vanished from their hard drives.
Another commenter stated, “Today, the same thing occurred to us.” Even materials that my team uploaded via the web interface within the past year have vanished.
“This is absolutely terrible, as every single file for our company is lying there,”
Someone else wrote, “I have encountered the exact same issue today.” This will lead to significant complications if I cannot retrieve the files.
“I have done nothing but work on it for the past one to two years.” Every piece of my professional and personal files. Everything disappeared. “There must be hundreds of files vanished at once.”
In the interim, one commenter asserted that “all of my files that I have created or modified since May have vanished.” hundreds of folders and files.’
An additional user disclosed what they purported to be correspondence from the Google support staff.
The support team noted in the message that additional administrators had subsequently reported the problem.
They further stated, “Our Product Engineers are currently investigating this, and we are awaiting a root cause analysis to determine how to resolve it.”
Cloud Service Vulnerabilities
Currently, neither the origin of the problem nor the viability of file recovery are known.
Like other cloud services, Google Drive holds user files on remote servers accessible via the Internet.
Nevertheless, in the event of a malfunction with these centralized servers, the files may be irretrievably lost.
Google Cloud services for portions of the United States and Western Europe were brought offline earlier this year due to server damage caused by fire and water.
Although these service disruptions were only temporary, further unrest could lead to the irretrievable loss of users’ files.
