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Why does Dropbox ask for your computer password

Why does Dropbox ask for your computer password

Florian A.1
New member | Level 1

Hi, I just came across this blog post detailing some, shall we say, unorthodox ways Dropbox is circumventing OS X security features and tricking users into sharing their admin password:

http://applehelpwriter.com/2016/07/28/revealing-dropboxs-dirty-little-security-hack/

I found the same happened on my system (OS X 10.11.6), Dropbox v9.v.49). Can you explain why you do this?

35 Replies 35

Kim V.4
New member | Level 1

Andrew, and I'll ever understand why some people don't lose their minds when companies do things without telling consumers about it. This is a breach of trust, if you don't think so, well, ok. I do, and a lot of people agree with me.

If they were transparent about why they ask for elevated access to the system from the start, then no problem. It's the fact that this "hack" acts like a [removed by moderator] virus that's the problem. If I, the admin, remove it, it should never add itself again without my permission. And no, I don't mean like it does now by popping up the the dialog every time the system is rebooted. It shouldn't ask anymore.

From what's been said, this is to let Dropbox do stuff with Office. Why not ask the user if they want to use these features instead of forcing the feature on the user, especially when it requires that it does something as dubious as this?

Like stated above by others, this is not a good look for a company that proclaims privacy and security as their top mantras for all their users. Dropbox should be scrambling to rebuild trust and fix this, and not go "Well, it's not that bad" which is the feeling I have right now.

Rich
Super User II

Kim, please refrain from using profanity here or your posts will be deleted (or your account suspended). Your post has been edited. Thank you.

Kim V.4
New member | Level 1

Hilariously idiotic. It wasn't even a swear, but whatever.

Marcin D.
New member | Level 1

Yes, yes it was even if you attmepted to "make it not one"  it still was one.  

Robert T.19
New member | Level 1

Regardless of if it was good or bad of you to use accessibility permissions - please stop asking for the master password on every log in. Please redesign your permissions dialog sequence to use the latest API to ask for password ONCE.

If a user has already said no, you definitely do not need to ask again at every login... its just a terrible user experience and very annoying.

 

 

Leon N.
Helpful | Level 5

I don't recall if this was mentioned and I couldn't find anything about it by Googling, but it appears that there is similar behavior with the Finder extension setting. Specifically, Dropbox installs and enables a Finder extension. That's okay, other apps do the same. However, if I disable it (I don't like my Finder menus being cluttered), it comes back a few seconds later.

I'm having a hard time understanding why Dropbox insists on ignoring the user? If I remove a setting, it is a bad user experience to just set it back again. If it is critical to the operation of the app, give me a message and let me decide if I want a degraded experience.

With Dropbox making multiple changes to my computer without my consent and reapplying these changes when I remove them, I quickly lose trust. Unfortunately, I use many apps that leverage Dropbox in some way. It will take me a lot of work to replace these programs. I will go through the trouble if Dropbox continues this unfriendly behavior.

Tim H.38
New member | Level 2

This whole disgusting episode has convinced me that I can no longer go on with Dropbox. This company seems to have lost all respect for its users and it has abused trust just too often in too many different ways.

 

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    Tim H.38 New member | Level 2
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