Dropbox acquires Boxcryptor. What will happen to all those files that have been encrypted?

Thanks for initiating this discussion and asking questions about the Boxcryptor integration. 

I'm Andrea, product manager for our native end-to-end encryption solution. I can confirm that we are working on this product (zero knowledge encryption, natively integrated with Dropbox) for business customers. While I can't confirm a specific timeline or roadmap at the moment, I want to assure you that we are aware of your need for this native integration. Also, we (and especially I personally) read your comments/wishes/ideas and all feedback shared in this forum. 

Hi all. Glad to hear people are having success testing boxcryptor install on a fresh system to ensure we can access our files after March even when the main BC site goes down. However, we still have two looming problems by my reckoning. The first was mentioned previously; Apple updates OSX in a way that is incompatible with the client, and we know the client is EOL. But I would strongly encourage everyone to consider this second point. Did you actually decrypt all your files away from BC? Did you actually run a recursive search over the filesystem looking for any filenames in kanji? I always thought that was a clever trick BC used for filename encryption by leveraging the namespace of Unicode or UTF-32 or whatever it is and using printable Japanese characters that encoded English characters underneath. But now, is everyone sure you decrypted everything? How did you search for any remaining encrypted files? The official recommendation was simply to copy every file in BC to an unencrypted volume and sure that would work. But I didn't have enough storage around to do that, so I tried to go directory by directory hunting for encrypted stragglers. How does one even write a recursive grep for the possible character set BC uses? Has anyone else solved this problem? I've posted this concern before but no one seems to know.

I decrypted everything I had in both Dropbox and other locations. It was a painful process. Alot of errors along the way, leaving you with half completed folders. Most efficient way for me personally was to decrypt one folder at a time, even down into subfolders  for very large folders. Took a few days to do.

Hi, 

cd <THE FOLDER YOU WANT TO START YOUR SEARCH FROM>
grep -r -i --include='*.bc' \.

Let me know if there are any questions!

And, just to close the loop on this, I was able to use that grep and it surfaced about half a dozen directories in dark corners of my Dropbox volume that were still encrypted with Boxcryptor.  Knowing I verifiably decrypted everything 100% gives me a lot more peace of mind.  I am finally ready for BC to (sadly) go away.

chrissos Thank you very much for your open and honest words. I can assure you that our team is working hard on the native integration of end-to-end encryption and will inform the community as soon as the new feature is available. I would be happy if you would try the feature again once it is available and give it another chance.

Shame on you for not providing a time path and more clarity. I'm losing trust and will probably move to a zero-knowledge provider.

Hi Anton, 

I totally understand that you are not happy with the current situation. 

However, I want to confirm once again that we are already working on zero knowledge encryption, natively integrated with Dropbox for business customers. While I can't confirm a specific timeline or roadmap at the moment, I want to assure you that we are aware of your need for this native integration. Our team is working hard to deliver something as quickly as possible. Nonetheless, we need to make sure we deliver a product that meets the needs of our users - from a product, usability, and security perspective. I will let you know as soon as there is an update on end-to-end encryption here at Dropbox. Thank you for your patience!

Wait... It sounds like Dropbox acquired Boxcryptor and will be paywalling it behind the most expensive tier which also requires a MINIMUM of 3 users?  I would really like to know if this is the case before my subscription renews because that would require ~$1000AUD/yr as opposed to the already expensive ~$300AUD/yr I have been paying.  I really hope I have that wrong here.

Hi Eethan, 

I appreciate your feedback! End-to-end encryption will be offered to our business customers, but we did not yet finalize any pricing/bundling/add-on decisions. 

I will make sure to share your feedback internally, thank you so much. 

As a paying Dropbox Plus user, I hope there can be a user tier short of "Business" (now $45/month for the minimum of three users), that includes Boxcryptor. Perhaps incorporate Boxcryptor in what is now "Professional?"

Thanks for your response, apfund.

While it is good news to hear that it is at least being discussed, most of us here are losing our encryption service before any alternative is being offered, leaving us scrambling for another solution.  Mine ends in May, and Dropbox unfortunately hasn't provided a solution to the problem they ultimately created.  I do hope to keep using Dropbox, but I need this encryption-type, and this has really inconvenienced myself and a lot of users.  I would have hoped this matter would be treated with a little more urgency.

I completely understand your frustration and the inconvenience this has caused for you and other users.

While I don't have an immediate solution to offer, I'll pass on your feedback to my team.  But I can assure you, that they are aware of the urgency and are already working on this topic. Thank you!

I'm getting tired of these lame excuses. I'm going to move to a zero-knowledge platform.

Well, I asked the BC team last year if they were going to offer something new and similar after Boxcryptor was discontinued. I even asked if it was possible to get the rights to create a clone. All I got were automated messages. We may never know what made BC adapt the poor communication behavior of Dropbox and why they ruined their "baby" after so many years. Will we ever know what motivated BC to leave all the customers out in the cold instead of leaving everything as it was and just coming up with the new product and strategy when it was ready and fully functional? Normally Germans don't do things like that. Maybe Andrea can finally give us some reasons. Anyway, I'm now happily working with Filen, which is also a German startup and reminds me of how it all started with BC more than a decade ago. It replaced my DB and BC and provides zero knowledge encryption. No more two applications needed. As usual, every disaster leads to something new and better in the end...

You "cannot commit to a date"

Act first, think later?

"Although we cannot commit to" bla bla bla, "please be assured that" bla bla bla..

Sounds like "Your call is important to us, so stay on the line"

Anton D. thanks for the follow up!

We are in the process of finalizing an Early Access version or our native end-to-end encryption, which is scheduled for release in Q4 of this year. This version will be made available to a select group of customers, allowing them to try it out and provide valuable feedback.

Additionally, we have set a target release date for the public version of our native end-to-end encryption for business customers. We anticipate that this version will be ready for launch in Q1 of 2024.

Thank you for "staying on the line"!

I'm considering migrating all my data off Dropbox based on this decision. I've been using Dropbox since it was basically a startup and using a paid account for years now.

Boxcryptor was the best solution and DB acquired them and then removed the service but provided no alternative.

They could've seamlessly integrated the product with their UI/product but now we have to rely on less reliable options including Cryptomator or others. I've been testing Cryptomator and it doesn't work nearly as well. I will say Cryptomator does seem much faster than BC though, which is nice.

I already have a Synology with a file sync so most of Dropbox's services can be replaced. We all know Dropbox is just a custom rsync with a desktop shell but DB did a great job with that shell but overtime it's becoming a bloated behemoth.

It also appears Boxcryptor was the only service with proper MFA/YubiKey integration for disk encryption, which are all best practices for security. Dropbox doesn't care about their customers or the customers they acquired from BC.

I see the mention of a road map for Q1 2024 release (which we know could be delayed). But then why was Boxcryptor disabled so quickly? Why not sunset it Q3 2024 so all of your customers to have to spend dozens of hours reconfiguring and switching services depending on their level of integration and volume of data managed. No answer... I would be more understanding if there was a legitimate explanation or other issue. 

I appreciate your openness and the feedback you've shared in this discussion adamel85 . 

Martin R.19 I completely understand your frustration, and while I strive to be as transparent as possible, there are certain questions I'm unable to answer.

We are diligently working on the development of a native end-to-end encryption solution, which is on track for release in Q1 2024, with early access planned for Q4 2023. If there are any further updates or developments, I'll be sure to share them with you all.