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After several years, my Dropbox files and folders are gone

I've had my Dropbox account for many years and had stored many files/folders there. I haven't visited it in several years as I didn't need to access those files at the time. I tried to access them today only to find all my own files/folders were gone. I still have some shared folders from about 5 years ago, but none of my own files. Was there a purge done in the last 3 years that would have removed them all? I checked my old laptop where I had synced/installed the Dropbox app and they were not showing up there either.

Thanks

John

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Comments

Walter

Hey @John B - sorry to hear about this.

You must have logged into the account sometime in the previous year, otherwise the account would have been closed due to inactivity probably.

Do you see any signs of your missing files in your events page by the way? This is the place where all uploads, edits, and deletions are normally logged so it should give you a hint.

In any case, please keep us posted, John.

John B

I don't see an "Events" option, just Photos, Signatures, Shared, File Rqeuests, Deletions. Nothing is in Deletions. Accounts are closed for inactivity? Hmm you'd think there would be warning on that. If it was closed due to inactivity and I logged in after that time, would it remember folders that were shared with me by others?

John

Hannah

Hey @John B , sorry to jump in here.

Walter linked the events page for you in his reply above, but here it is again:

https://www.dropbox.com/events

Accounts are closed after 12 months of inactivity, but if you can see old shared folders from years ago, then no such action was taken on your account.

Do you remember any file names, so that you can search for them through the search bar at the top left of this page?

RdL_uy

Hi all,

I used to have around 2gb of information, now for some reason, all this information suddenly disapeared.

Has someone faced the same problem?

Rich

@RdL_uy wrote:
I used to have around 2gb of information, now for some reason, all this information suddenly disapeared.

When was the last time you accessed the account? Do you see anything on your Events page?

RdL_uy

Hi, I access regularly, I have not been working this days, but around 2 weeks I access and everything was there. It seems like the account has been reseted for some reason

Mark

What is Events showing as @Rich asked?

RdL_uy

Hi, I had no notifications, but checked now as rich said, seems all files have been deleted, seems I have been able to restore everything.

The strange thing of all, is that this operation (deleting) have been while I have been on vacations and for instance not close to afect anything in the account. Any thoughts about this?

Mark

Check at https://www.dropbox.com/account/security to make sure you can see what devices are connected and remove unused ones,

Also on one of the restored files open up the Previous Versions menu to see which device deleted it - it may be that the date shown is inaccurate

Xmas Tree

I haven’t use Dropbox for about 5-6 years. I thought all my pictures still be there, unfortunately, when I logged in couple of days ago all my files and pictures weren’t there anymore… 😩
Does it mean that Dropbox just deleted everything?

Hannah

Sorry to hear about this, @Xmas Tree.

When an account has been inactive for more than 12 moths, it should actually be completely deleted.

When you tried to login to your account, did the site allow you to simply login, or were you perhaps prompted to create a new account with your email address?

Xmas Tree

Hello 👋. It allowed me to log in. I didn’t have to create a new account.

Megan

Hey @Xmas Tree, considering you've last logged into the account 5-6 years ago, it sounds logical that the content wouldn't be there.

As a last thing, you can always check your events page, to see if it's empty or not. The Events page at www.dropbox.com/events gives you an overview of all activity in your account including files events (adds/edits/deletes), as well as adding or removing shared folders.