I recently tried to discover if there was a way to passsword protect an individual folder within Google Drive.

I recently tried to discover if there was a way to passsword protect an individual folder within Google Drive. Apparently it's not possible to do so and, although Help forums and blogs have been saying to wait patiently for years, this has never become a feature.

So I checked Box (my second favorite cloud), which does have that feature, but only for Business/Pro accounts. 

And then I checked OneDrive thinking Microsoft, with decades of dealing with security, would offer greater security on their cloud service.

No Bueno.

For the life of me, I can't figure out why this extra layer of security isn't already in place. People not only backup their important documents, like tax returns, but they backup documentation with their address, their SSNs, their medical records and hosts of other sensitive data.

Recently I was filling out a job application where the hiring company had requested that I email or fax it back to them. First of all, I live in the 21st century, I don't have a fax machine. Secondly, I'm not sending my SSN, address, W4 and dozens of other pages over the internet to be copied and stored indefinitely on dozens of servers for a job. (And not a good one at that)

So, I tried to find a more secure medium and couldn't. Why not? Google wants us all to backup our documents to their cloud. So does Dropbox and OneDrive. The 'cloud' is the future of mobile computing. And yet, there isn't that simple extra layer of protection. Even for those of us with Apps accounts. If I was a business I'd be very concerned about cloud security, especially considering the sort of documentation I might be keeping for legal or contractual reasons.

Originally shared by Christopher Elliott

Don't do it until you've read this story by Bob Sullivan.
http://elliott.org/advice-you-can-take/read-this-before-you-upload-your-tax-return/

Comments

I haven't dealt much with the cloud, yet, but recently started looking into it as a way to have a remote back-up of all my working data. As I was not uploading it to share with anyone, I explored these options: http://www.theverge.com/2012/4/24/2954960/google-drive-dropbox-skydrive-sugarsync-cloud-storage-competition
Jason ON said…
I've heard of a lot of those and haven't heard of a few of them.  According to your article, though, Box does allow password protecting files. Hmm ... I'll have to recheck that.
That article is over 2 years old now, though. A couple of those options seemed appealing, but upon further investigation, I learned that they are no longer free. Keep that in mind, too.

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