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Dropbox account deleted

I had a dropbox account since 2010 at least. I have been using it regularly. I just found out that my account has been deleted?? I was able to create a new account on the same email address. My account was part of a business account as well and I have lost access to all of my files both personal and business. I never received any email regarding this. The last email I got was just a regular update to shared folders on Nov 7th so this means it happened between 7.11.2023 and today 30.11.2023.
Also because I had to create a new account, my free storage has also been reduced and is now only 2gb.
How can I get access to my files back? my personal files.

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Jay

Hi @omerzafeer, thanks for bringing this to our attention.

It sounds like you were a member of a Dropbox Business team, meaning that the team admin technically owned your account, and they deleted your account.

Unfortunately, since you were able to create a new Dropbox account under the same email, this means it's been more than 7 days since the deletion, which is the period reserved for the team admin to restore your account.

At this point, you'll need to ask the team admin to see if they still have a copy of your files, and for them to transfer the files to you directly.

If you have any further queries, feel free to message back.

omerzafeer

Hi Jay
Thank you very much for replying. Are you sure it was deleted by the team admin? If that is the case, it is a serious breach of my privacy under local laws. Can you please assure me if it was deleted by the admin? And also, does the admin have access to my personal files as well? That does not make much sense to be honest. I had had my dropbox account for more than a decade and I was added to the team not more than 6 months ago.
I thought my personal account and files were mine and nobody else had access to them.

Jay

If you were a member of a Dropbox Business team, they could have access to all your files depending on the plan they're on.

Since you mentioned you couldn't login to the account, what error message did you get back then?

When you join a team, you get the option to merge your account or keep your personal files separate. Do you remember which option you chose?

omerzafeer

It just said no account associated with this email and took me to the sign up page. I think I checked the merge option but i am not sure.

Mark

@omerzafeer wrote:
I was added to the team not more than 6 months ago.
I thought my personal account and files were mine and nobody else had access to them.

When you are onboarded to the Team you are told this is the case. Everything that you 'had' becomes the Teams' when you join. Its why you are almost forced to set up a second account for the Team instead of moving yours over.

omerzafeer

unfortunately I was not told that. I saw someone else's account and it showed two separate folders. Their own files and the company's. So I thought they will both stay separate.
Unfortunately the admin only has the official files and not my personal. So are they just.... gone? forever?

Hannah

Hey @omerzafeer, have you asked the admin to see if they have the option to restore your account?

omerzafeer

I have sent them an email but unfortunately there is a time difference of almost 12 hours between the two of us so it might still take a few more hours to a reply from them. In the meantime, could you please confirm if they or dropbox themself can restore my personal files? Thanks a bunch!

Hannah

I'm afraid that if the admin has deleted the account, the files cannot be restored by us, Omer.

Let's hope that the admin can restore the account.

omerzafeer

Thank you very much. I’ll update if it is a success.
Isn’t this a fatal flaw in dropbox’s design that an admin can just delete your account altogether instead of just removing you from the team? Doesn’t dropbox inform them that this action will delete the entire account and not just remove the member from the team?

omerzafeer

Also if it has been more than 7 days since deletion, can the admin still restore? Or then does it all just depend on the off chance of the admin having an offline copy of your files? Also why does an admin have access to team members’ private files?