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No Privacy on Amazon's Cloud Drive

Summary: Amazon Cloud Drive sounds great, if you don't mind giving Amazon the right to do pretty much anything they want with your account and files.

Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols

By for Networking |

Who couldn't love the idea of the new Amazon Cloud Drive? You get at least 5GBs of free cloud-based storage, and its trivial to get 20GBs of free storage on Amazon Cloud Drive. Used in concert with the Amazon Cloud Player you get a fine cloud-based music player that can be used either from a Web browser or on Android tablets with the Amazon MP3 App. The new Amazon consumer cloud service also works well. It's just too bad that you have to give up all privacy to use it.

Don't believe me? Read the Amazon Cloud Drive Terms of Use for yourself. In particular, take a glance at: Section 5.2:

"5.2 Our Right to Access Your Files. You give us the right to access, retain, use and disclose your account information and Your Files: to provide you with technical support and address technical issues; to investigate compliance with the terms of this Agreement, enforce the terms of this Agreement and protect the Service and its users from fraud or security threats; or as we determine is necessary to provide the Service or comply with applicable law"

Wow. Amazon can do pretty much anything they want with your files Like say let the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) inspect your music files for any signs that you haven't pay full price for them. You remember the RIAA; they're the ones who want $75-trillion from LimeWire for allowing 11,000 songs to be illegally shared.

As my pal, Jan Wildeboer, Red Hat's EMEA Open Source Evangelist put it, "I suspect that continuous inspection is part of the deal to get the music industry accept these offerings--IP radicalism at its best."  He's almost certainly right. In return for the "right" to play your music from the cloud, you have to put up with Big Brother.

I like Amazon's services, but I don't like it well enough to put up with this nonsense. Besides, there area already services out there that offer similar services without such draconian privacy violations. For cloud-based music, there's SoundCloud and Mougg. If it's just cloud-based storage you want, Dropbox is still my cloud-storage service of choice.

Nice try Amazon, but you'll excuse me if I don't give you the right to access, retain, use and disclose my account information and my files.

See Also:

Amazon launches Cloud Drive: An easy to use tablet play that takes AWS consumer Test drive of Amazon Cloud Drive for MP3s

Amazon launches Android Appstore

Is Amazon Set to Go After Apple in the Mobile Space?

Topics: Storage, Amazon, Hardware, Legal, Security

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66 comments
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  • RE: No Privacy on Amazon's Cloud Drive

    Waaa! Privacy! Waaaa!

    Really? It's a list of MP3's. Who cares?
    Droid101
    Reply Vote

    • It's not just MP3's

      @Droid101

      You can upload other files as well.
      oncall
      Reply Vote

    • RE: No Privacy on Amazon's Cloud Drive

      @Droid101

      Not a list, but the actual files containing metadata and checksums that can be compared against known pirated music files. Amazon must be in cahoots with lawyers looking to make money.
      thofts
      Reply Vote

      • RE: No Privacy on Amazon's Cloud Drive

        @thofts
        The presence of a pirated file does not implicate piracy.
        Droid101
        Reply Vote

      • RE: No Privacy on Amazon's Cloud Drive

        @Droid101 - The presence of a Lamborghini in the storage unit you rented suggests that you got it from somewhere.

        We are losing it...
        pwatson
        Reply Vote

      • Droid101 is just acting as any good servant of the system would

        @thofts & pwatson<br><br>Droid101 is exactly as the name implies, just a droid and so he's going along with whatever the system commands is the norm. Should it say you must give us copies of keys to your home then he will do so and will dutifully mock anyone who speaks out in opposition like a good little servant. <br><br>Its not that we're losing it but that enough brain dead TV obsessed zombies are now fully programmed to do as the system commands and so its now time for the next phase; elimination of the protections (Freedoms, rights & privacy) that were what made this country great. After all if you want to take down a population you have to enslave them mentally before you can physically put them in chains.<br><br>@Droid101 Please reply back with the Conspiracy Theory system approved standard response so I have justification to list examples to back up this stance.
        BlueCollarCritic
        Reply 1 Vote

    • No privacy on ANY cloud!

      @Droid101
      Like storing your financial information at the city library. Convenient? yes. Secure? Heck NO!
      kd5auq
      Reply Vote

    • RE: No Privacy on Amazon's Cloud Drive

      @Droid101 Apparently you don't have the intelligence to understand the repercussions of this. But I suppose if your a teeny-bopper without any worries in the world as your reply suggest, then no, you don't have anything to worry about until the RIAA comes knocking at your door wanting $75000 of your parents money.....
      Tinman57
      Reply Vote

      • RE: No Privacy on Amazon's Cloud Drive

        @Tinman57 If you don't have stolen music, you don't have that problem. You certainly don't have that problem if what's stored on the Amazon Cloud Drive is the music you're buying from the Amazon MP3 store.
        jgm@...
        Reply Vote

    • RE: No Privacy on Amazon's Cloud Drive

      @Droid101...don't be an agent of insanity...it's more than a framework for convenience...it's a surveillance grid to watch you. Just because you don't have anything to hide doesn't give another thing the right to spy on you.
      info@...
      Reply 1 Vote

  • RE: No Privacy on Amazon's Cloud Drive

    DropBox runs on Amazon Web Services. SoundCloud may run on AWS as well. If you want privacy on AWS use something like JungleDisk that allows encryption with keys controlled by the user.
    zlgtr
    Reply Vote

    • RE: No Privacy on Amazon's Cloud Drive

      @zlgtr DropBox may run on AWS but it encrypts the files it stores there using your password. Dropbox employees can't even access your files.
      gwconnery@...
      Reply Vote

      • RE: No Privacy on Amazon's Cloud Drive

        @gwconnery<br><br>If you carefully read what they say and read the forums you'll realize that they don't encrypt your files with your password. They actual encrypt the data with their own master key. They only say "Dropbox employees aren't able to access user files". Remember also that you use this same password to logon so it is stored in some form on their servers and it can be reset! If you read <a href="https://www.dropbox.com/help/28" target="_blank" rel="nofollow"><a href="https://www.dropbox.com/help/28" target="_blank" rel="nofollow">https://www.dropbox.com/help/28</a></a> they explicitly state that they don't support private encryption keys and discuss a workaround using Truecrypt.<br><br>"Dropbox currently does not support the creation of your own private keys....While not officially supported, some users have reported success mounting truecrypt volumes in their Dropbox. Truecrypt allows you to create your own private volume complete with your own private keys."<br><br>Compare to JD:<br>"Be careful when enabling encryption [i.e. using custom key]. If you forget the encryption key you select you will not be able to retrieve your files in the future....If you lose your key neither Jungle Disk nor Amazon can help you retrieve it." I.e. real encryption: only you have the key and if you lose it, your data is toast unless you used a really bad password.

        Most cloud storage doesn't implement proper encryption. Good systems encrypt the data using a key only you know before it leaves your PC and then send it to the server through an SSL tunnel. On the server it is encrypted and doesn't matter who gains access to the data because only you have access to the encryption key. If JD is a bit demanding, SpiderOak is another service worth checking out: See https://spideroak.com/blog/20110109191539-fbi-wants-your-data-part-deux
        zlgtr
        Reply Vote

      • RE: No Privacy on Amazon's Cloud Drive

        @gwconnery@... But how do you actually KNOW that? Because it says so on their site? Gimme a few minutes to adjuct my Home Page and I'll have a new cloud for you to use. Care to suggest a new name for it?
        tom@...
        Reply Vote

      • RE: No Privacy on Amazon's Cloud Drive

        @gwconnery@... Just to back up what zlgtr said with an anecdote: I set up Dropbox for my dad (to sync between his main desktop and an easier to handle laptop). Of course, he lost his password, and I hadn't saved it anywhere. I did, however, regularly do all his backups, so I was ready to help him simply setup a new account... but for the heck of it, we tried the "forgot your password" routine at Dropbox, and I wrote up the email message from my dad's email account. Minutes later, the password was reset, a new one selected, and files re-accessible.
        In other words, 1) I could have been any bozo impersonating my dad (no security questions, nothing) and 2) Dropbox can do anything they want with the files, if they so please (or get an offer they can't bring themselves to refuse).
        I still use Dropbox all the time, but I'm under no illusion about the security it offers and take proper precautions (backups, encryption).
        overnout
        Reply Vote

  • well... it is in the definition of &quot;cloud&quot;.

    it is a stupid problem, really stupid. Why would one even want to create such a problem?
    pupkin_z
    Reply Vote

  • That's probably Apple's sticking point with cloud music

    Who on earth would allow their files to be access or RETAIN your files??? Amazon is even more evil than Google is.
    thofts
    Reply Vote

  • How are these services different from MP3.com...

    ...Which was shut down oh so long ago?
    x I'm tc
    Reply Vote

  • Anti-cloud

    There is one really anti-cloud could application that I use daily. It can sync like a cloud but is not a cloud. Check it out
    http://jointlogic.com/b-folders/2/
    olafohman
    Reply Vote

  • RE: No Privacy on Amazon's Cloud Drive

    Put your data in the Cloud at YOUR OWN risk!
    james347
    Reply Vote
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