Preventing folders being deleted when the owner deletes them

[Paul Willson]

I belong to a club where all our documents are held in a free Dropbox ccount by the Secretary and he has shared them with me as his assistant.

He will shortly be standing down as Secretary and I will take over, when he does this he will delete all the Folders and files from his Dropbox account and computer. When he does this am I correct in that they will also be deleted from my computer?

Am I correct in thinking that if he changes the ownership of the folders and files to me they will not be deleted from my computer?

If he changes the ownership of a folder with many documents in ill they also not be deleted from my computer or does he need to go into each folder and change ownership for each of the documents in the folder.?

What I am trying to do is prevent any folders and files being feleted so that I still still use them after he has deleted them fro his Dropbox and computer.

Any advice would be much appreciated.

[Lusil · Accepted solution]

Hello @Paul Willson, thanks for posting your question here. 

If they delete the files themselves from the shared folders, they will be removed for others as well. 

In this case, I'd recommend making you the new owner of the shared folders/files, and then removing their access from them. 

Out of curiosity, are they looking to just remove the files or delete their account as well?

Looking forward to hearing back from you. 

[Paul Willson]

Hi Lusil

Thank you for your reply.

They will only remove the folders and files from their Dropbox not delete their account as he can then carry on using it for his own use.

[Jay]

Hi @Paul Willson, in this instance, it would be best, as my colleague @Lusil suggests, to have them change ownership of the shared folders to you, without deleting any files at all. 

Afterwards, either you or he can permanently remove their access to the folder. This way the folder will be deleted from their account only, and they won't be able to rejoin it from the sharing tab.