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Phone stolen - what happens to the files if the thief deletes them?

Hello everyone,

I've had this question in my mind since joining the paid version of DropBox and after not receiving answers from the Contact support question, I'm humbly putting it to you, with the hope that you can help me out in securing my DropBox.

My question is the following: my smartphone is connected to my online DropBox, which is good, meaning everytime I receive a photo it is automatically uploaded to my online DB and I can delete it from my phone knowing that it's available online from anywhere. But what happens if: someone steals my phone, connects to the DropBox (which he/she would not need my password for since I'm automatically connected) and deletes my photos and files. They will disappear from the online version, therefore I will not have access to them either through my phone or through another device since they've been deleted already. What can I do to avoid that, i.e. to make sure that everything that's posted online will remain there? (This includes other files that I am synchronising from my smartphone like bookmarks or contacts). The reason that I am asking is that the main reason to pay for an extended DropBox was to make available my files and photos to myself from anywhere in the world, but if all it takes for those to disappear permanently is for someone to take my smartphone that is on and get into my DB and delete everything, then I wonder if my files and photos are secure enough and what I should do to further protect them.

Thanks so much in advance and have a great day/night all, from wherever/ whenever you are reading this message!

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Mark

Hi @PL89

That is what would happen yes - if the device is stolen and they log on to Dropbox they could delete everything.

BUT to do that they would need to know your PIN code or FaceID as well as any security on the Dropbox app to log on.

The flip side is you can disconnect (unlink) the phone app from the Dropbox website by following https://help.dropbox.com/accounts-billing/settings-sign-in/device-list-remote-sign-out

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Mark

Hi @PL89

That is what would happen yes - if the device is stolen and they log on to Dropbox they could delete everything.

BUT to do that they would need to know your PIN code or FaceID as well as any security on the Dropbox app to log on.

The flip side is you can disconnect (unlink) the phone app from the Dropbox website by following https://help.dropbox.com/accounts-billing/settings-sign-in/device-list-remote-sign-out

Здравко

Hi @PL89,

Everybody able to access your phone can do whatever you can without password with all your resources there (including Dropbox). Because of this, important step is to protect your phone content generally. Of course, such a protection isn't very reliable, but is usually enough, since someone on the street that steals phones usually doesn't know how to break your protection fast. The last is valid for everything, as I said already. In particular for Dropbox, once you find out that your phone (or other device) has been stolen, unlink this device as soon as possible from your account. In such a way, without link anew (i.e. somebody aware of your credentials), the particular phone (or any device) can NOT affect your Dropbox content in any way.

How you can unlink some device without access to there? All devices linked to your account are enlisted in your Dropbox Security Settings (scroll down to "Devices" section). Click on the trash bin icon, associated with the device, you want to unlink. 😉 That's it.

Hope this helps.

PL89

Hi @Mark,

Thanks a lot! Very helpful. I'll make sure that my phone & laptop are well protected and in the hopefully unlikely event where I would lose one of these, I will use the option of disconnecting them from my account.

Thanks again!

PL89

Hi @Здравко,

Many thanks indeed! I'll strengthen the passwords etc. that protect my devices and will use the ultimate option of disconnecting them should I lose any of those. Thank you for your help 😉

(I'm also now looking into the Vault thingy for the most important files, but I guess I can't move everything that I have into it...)