Photo: Dado Ruvic / reuters
The company alleges that certain users were engaging in storage resale and utilizing the service for illicit activities.
Dropbox Limits Unlimited Storage in Response to Abusive Activity
Cloud storage provider Dropbox is making changes to its business-focused Advanced plan by eliminating unlimited storage due to an increase in suspicious behavior. In a blog post, the company noted that other services, such as Google Workspace, have also implemented similar storage capacity limits. Dropbox revealed that the Advanced plan was being misused for activities unrelated to running a business or organization, including crypto and Chia mining, individuals pooling storage for personal use, and even storage reselling.
While acknowledging that there may be legitimate cases requiring unlimited storage, Dropbox emphasized that bad actors were consuming significantly more storage than genuine business customers, which resulted in an unreliable experience for all users. Although the company already has policies in place to prevent abusive behavior, it deemed creating acceptable-use restrictions as unfeasible. As a result, Dropbox will be transitioning to a metered model.
Starting from November 1st, existing users will be gradually shifted to the modified Advanced plan. Dropbox will provide customers with a minimum of 30 days’ notice before migrating them to the new policy. More than 99 percent of Advanced plan users utilize less than 35TB of storage per license. These teams will be allowed to maintain their current storage usage at the time of migration, along with an additional 5TB of pooled storage for five years, all without any price increase.
For users exceeding 35TB of storage per license, a similar offer will be extended for one year. Dropbox will collaborate with these customers to identify a long-term solution that satisfies all parties. The maximum storage limit for all versions of the Advanced plan will be capped at 1,000TB.
Effective immediately, the purchase of an Advanced plan with three licenses will include a total of 15TB of pooled storage. Each additional license will add 5TB of storage. Furthermore, as of September 18th for new users (November 1st for current users), Dropbox will introduce storage add-ons. These add-ons will be available for $10 per month for 1TB on a month-to-month payment plan, or at a discounted rate of $8 per month for annual purchases.
Dropbox’s decision to implement these changes reflects the need to address the misuse of unlimited storage plans, primarily attributed to the activities of crypto enthusiasts.