Ubuntu One deletes files without notifying user, data lost permanently

[Otto Kekäläinen]

I have been suspicious for a while that Ubuntu One might corrupt or delete files, since the syncing is so buggy, so I've been collection md5sums for files in U1 folders. Now I can prove that Ubuntu One did in fact delete some of my files, in could and on all devices, without any notice and without ability to recover them.

Case: I have an paid U1 account where I store my music (mp3/ogg) archive (24 GB). The folder is synced on my stationary home computer and on my laptop. I added a new album to the home computer and it synced fine with U1. Then I started up my laptop, which has eCryptfs encryption and U1 there synced the album except for two files.

Expected: If syncing of some files fail, there should be an error message to user and download on that client should gracefully fail, not affecting the could or other devices.

Actual result: The two files that failed to sync from could to laptop where deleted from could, and from home computer, and there was no notification to user whatsoever. Files lost and I wouldn't had noticed anything unless I'd do a md5sum scan.

Files lost (output from md5sum -c):
Antonio Vivaldi/Le quattro stagioni, Op. 8 No. 1-4 (Musici di San Marco feat. conductor: Alberto Lizzio)/Antonio Vivaldi - Concerto No. 1 in Mi maggiore, RV 269 "La primavera": III. Danza pastorale allegro.oga: avaaminen tai luku EPÄONNISTUI
Antonio Vivaldi/Le quattro stagioni, Op. 8 No. 1-4 (Musici di San Marco feat. conductor: Alberto Lizzio)/Antonio Vivaldi - Concerto No. 1 in Mi maggiore, RV 269 "La primavera": II. Largo e pianissimo sempre.oga: avaaminen tai luku EPÄONNISTUI

U1 account for user launchpad.net/~otto and folder named "Musiikki".

I marked this as a security bug as losing files is a security issue, even if the reason that files was lost is not due to a direct security breach.

I have a vague feeling I might have reported about U1 deleting files before too, but I can't browse all of my old bug reports in Launchpad due to bug #5977. I am running 12.04.2 and this bug is real, so I decided to make sure there is a bug report about it.

[Roman Yepishev (rye)]

"Antonio Vivaldi - Concerto No. 1 in Mi maggiore, RV 269 "La primavera": III. Danza pastorale allegro.oga" is encrypted to a filename of 213 characters on my own system which is dangerously close to _PC_NAME_MAX 255. I can see how this can be a problem when a file from non-ecryptfs filesystem gets transferred to an ecryptfs mount - the file cannot be created.

Syncdaemon should definitely not mark the synchronization as complete at this point since if it does, the next sync will delete the file from the remote storage too.

[Otto Kekäläinen (otto)]

I installed Dropbox and tested how it handles the situation. In fact is does sync these files. Since the encrypted length is less than 255 that wasn't the problem and Dropbox works fine. The issue must be due to something else.

[Ilya (ppp0-at)]

Same thing, i've added replaced files from backup to ubunto one folder and now after reboot, there is no backup! No files ! Just files from sync server !$%@

[Otto Kekäläinen (otto)]

I already switched from paid 80 GB subscription to not using U1 at all and instead enjoying self-hosted OwnCloud system.

[Otto Kekäläinen (otto)]

I am the original reporter of this and I now read the other bug report. I disagree that they are duplicates. In the case above I was able to *always* reproduce the error and it *always happened to the same files*, due to issues in their file name length.

[Flames_in_Paradise (ellisistfroh-deactivatedaccount)]

http://www.omgubuntu.co.uk/2014/07/ubuntu-one-files-service-closes-today

U1 - as a storage was shut down.