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Special account with packrat since 2009 - All deleted files permanently deleted ?

Hello,

I’ve got a big problem.

First of all, sorry for my english.

I’m a very early user of Dropbox, since 2009, one of the first users.

image 2021-07-03 à 20.45.46.png

After a basic account, I upgraded during two years for an account with the « packrat ». Understand that at this period, this « packrat » option gave us the possibility to restore deleted files and older version of files with no limit of time. (sort of infinite "dropbox rewind" if we should compare to today naming).

At the end of 2011, Dropbox told me that as one of the first members, my account (30 Go with packrat) would be from there free and I would be put on a special list.

So from 2011 to this day, during 10 years, I’ve been able to restore all my deleted files that have been stored and deleted with no limit of time. Just by searching them in the search bar, the old deleted files was always found and shown to be restored.

I’ve used since 2011 my dropbox to store many work files, and I took this habit to use my dropbox as a sort of hard drive.

But today, for the first time, I can’t find my past files.

I’m really scared that the dropbox team have mistaken my account for a basic account and sort of downgrade it, so that all my deleted files that I could restore from 2009 have been permanently deleted.

Please help me.

Thank you by advance.

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Mark

Hi @raouldouglas

PackRat was discontinued many years ago and became something you had to opt in to keep. So if you didnt opt in you will have lost it.

The other to check if you did opt in is that you have not changed your plan (other than the ones Dropbox have done themselves - i.e. space increases) OR missed or been late with payments. Any downgrade or account changes removes PackRat (i.e. a trial of Professional)

Mark

Edit: if you go to https://www.dropbox.com/account/plan it will show you what add ons etc. you have on your account.

For example mine says the following as I'm on a grandfathered plan from before PackRat:

Unlimited version history

Free unlimited file version history

raouldouglas

Mine just says that I have a basic account.

image 2021-07-04 à 01.07.14.png

It has always said that since my packrat account of 2011 became a free plan. For some time the packrat message was still there, and just disappeared at some point, but I could still restore all my files until today, and for many years. The searched engine that shows my deleted files from the past 12 years ago just stopped to work recently. The last old file I restored (more than 30 days and more than 180 days deleted) was on the 5th of june 2021.

Is there a risk that all my deleted files from the past 12 years have been permanently deleted ?

If so, there must have been a team member to do the change on my account recently. He couldn't haven't seen that those deleted files represent a certain amount of space disk and that they're still there and accessible for me since 2009 !

raouldouglas

Ok, I realize that maybe it's a problem in the search bar, because even if I search for a file that I deleted a few days ago (less than 30 days), it does not show in the results of the search engine. Only files that have not been deleted are shown in the search results now.

I can't just imagine someone in the dropbox team just delet permanently and erase all my 21 years deleted files that I had acces to. He should have seen that it represents a consequent amount of space disk (probably many To… 5 To, 10 To, maybe more). He should have send me an email befor doing that.

I'm a graphic designer and a comic book drawer. Go check my website >> [link removed by moderator]

Many of my working files are photoshop files. They can't have been all lost and erase permanently just by a wrong manipulation or by pressing a simple button.

Can you tell me if the team is working on the application right now ? Maybe it's a bug and that's for that reason I can't see any deleted files in the search results. Or is there now a specific new action to do for searching in the deleted files ?

Mark

Hi @raouldouglas

As you have a basic account now I'm afraid yes, all your historic files are lost. That isnt a person who has deleted them - its automated. You are not paying so no longer have access to that feature.

PackRat was a feature which was only ever was added to paid accounts. As I said in my first post if you stop paying, at all, you automatically lose PackRat.

I'm afraid there is no way now to recover those files.

There is no ongoing work or updates to Dropbox. It is all working as it should.

raouldouglas

I understand what you say, but in my case that's not true. I stopped paying for my account since 2011, and the packrat with infinite version history continued to work until this year, as the team said to me when they said my account with the packrat would be free in 2011, as I was one of the first members.

So if this function has worked until this year, my account must have been on a special list that no automatic dowgrade could be apply to it. There must be somewhere someone who has did it manually.

I can't imagine that all my files from 12 years are now lost.

Please can you put me in contact with a technical member ?

Mark

All support options are available at www.dropbox.com/support , however, as a free user the only support is here or Twitter. You can hope somebody sees and picks this up this week, but, I'd not hold your breath

raouldouglas

Ok, thank you, I'll up the thread during the following week.

raouldouglas

I'm in contact with assistance, but now I've proof that my account still have unlimited version history like Mark's one, because i've access to a file from 2010. I just restored it few minutes ago.

Here are some screen captures

The folder ils called "dynamo", it's a comic book I drawed during 2009/2010

image 2021-07-06 à 17.17.44.png

I restored the folder

image 2021-07-06 à 17.17.55.png

And here's the proof that a psd file of a page from far 2010 in this folder restored from 3 march 2010 to today 6 july 2021 at 17:16

image 2021-07-06 à 17.28.04.png

raouldouglas

So Mark, I advice you to beware with this "unlimited version history", because now Dropbox don't provide this service anymore, in none of their plans, even the most expensive, as they've understand it was the possibility for the user to have a sort of unlimited freespace hard drive disk.

So for me who had for all this years this option, they made it dissapear first from the page that display the specificity of my account without warning me and then just stopped the option.

Now I've open a new ticket with Dropbox, but it's been several weeks now and despite the fact they are saying to me the ticket is still open, I think they've erased all my "ghost history version files" and can't say anything to me or just "sorry man, that's just it".

Hope it will not happen to you. But beware.