Arq

[Weaselboy]

Saw that in the news this morning and agree it is skeevy on BackBlaze's part. Arq encrypts your data before it leaves your machine, so all BackBlaze can see in the folders on their server is gibberish.

I get why ethically you might want to ditch them though.

 

[planteater]

For those who subscribe to this particular thread who haven’t yet seen the flack about what Backblaze got caught doing...
Ben Cox on Twitter: "WTF? @backblaze 's B2 web UI seems to submit all of the names and sizes of my files in my B2 bucket to facebook. I noticed because I saw "waiting for facebook .com" at the bottom while trying to download a backup... ?!?!?!? I even opted out of their tracking widget thing! https://t.co/IkqkGNTkSi" / Twitter

Backblaze says it has pushed a fix, but this HN thread gives you an idea of the understandably unhappy reaction from Backblaze customers:
Backblaze submitting names and sizes of files in B2 buckets to Facebook | Hacker News (ycombinator.com)

While one commenter there says correctly that using B2 from Arq should be safe (especially if you’re using encryption), some of you may want to consider what this issue says about Backblaze. I’ve been a happy B2-via-Arq user since August, 2017, but am now re-evaluating the B2 part. Wasabi would be the apparent logical second choice on a price/performance-comparison basis, but I certainly am open to hearing about some of the other choices available via Arq (Storage Locations (arqbackup.com).

FYI.

I’m going to take a closer look at Backblazes response when I’m free, in order to determine what I do going forward. Tracking internal paid services and sending the results to a third party data miner is unacceptable. Even as a error. Very disturbing. Thanks for bringing this to my attention.

Edit: It’s issues like this that has me moving all my data out of any cloud unless I hold the encryption key like with Arq. Arq protected me from a BB screwup.

 

[BigMcGuire]

Why does this have to happen right after I buy a 2 year unlimited Backblaze ?! .... good grief. (I also choose my own encryption keys). Shesh.

The repetitive

looks horrible. lol.

Edit: Looks like they fixed it? I need to read before I comment.

 

[BigMcGuire]

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25919105 and https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25913516

Eh, I've see how people treat and abuse companies. I really don't care about this... I'm probably giving BackBlaze some benefit of the doubt but they haven't given me a reason not to.

So for the main thread:

Backblaze submitting names and sizes of files in B2 buckets to Facebook | Hacker News

news.ycombinator.com

These post stands out to me:

Not great comments about Wasabi at the end of that massive there, LOL.

 

[BigMcGuire]

Wonderful now I gotta decide.... What y'all concluded?

https://www.backblaze.com/company/payments-and-refunds.html

Refunds on 1-Year/2-Year Plans​

The free trial is designed to let you experience the service. However, if you sign up for a 1-year or 2-year plan and decide to cancel, you can request a full refund up to 30 days after subscribing to the service.

I'm almost done uploading 182GB to them . (encrypted with my own key).

 

[Apple_Robert]

Thanks to this thread and the latest trash with Backblaze (I hate FB) I am giving Arq a try. I just installed the trial and set up Amazon AWS.

Edited to add: BackBlaze should not have any tracking, in my opinion, especially a company that is in charge of securing identity and files of users.

 

[Apple_Robert]

Wonderful now I gotta decide.... What y'all concluded?

https://www.backblaze.com/company/payments-and-refunds.html

Refunds on 1-Year/2-Year Plans​

The free trial is designed to let you experience the service. However, if you sign up for a 1-year or 2-year plan and decide to cancel, you can request a full refund up to 30 days after subscribing to the service.

I'm almost done uploading 182GB to them . (encrypted with my own key).

I would ask for a refund.

 

[BigMcGuire]

I would ask for a refund.

Thanks - Just did. <sigh>. Just removed the data as well. :/.

 

[Apple_Robert]

Thanks - Just did. <sigh>. Just removed the data as well. :/.

In my opinion, there should be no need for FB or Google to be tracking what you do on BackBlaze. It seems that BB has sold their soul for extra money, unless I am have misunderstood the situation.

 

[Apple_Robert]

Does Arq support MFA (Multi-factor Authentication) from Amazon? Any of you use MFA on Amazon?

 

[Weaselboy]

Does Arq support MFA (Multi-factor Authentication) from Amazon? Any of you use MFA on Amazon?

Dunno... but email the dev and ask. The couple times I had questions, I got an answer the same day.

 

[BigMcGuire]

Does Arq support MFA (Multi-factor Authentication) from Amazon? Any of you use MFA on Amazon?

Good question - I just set up Arq with my OneDrive account. It uses OneDrive's authentication and login. I imagine it'll do the same thing with Amazon.

Not sure why I didn't just use OneDrive before... I'm paying for Office 365, might as well use it. I won't back up 182GB to it though, just personal file data - about 13GB. At least it isn't an additional expense over what I already pay.

 

[Apple_Robert]

Good question - I just set up Arq with my OneDrive account. It uses OneDrive's authentication and login. I imagine it'll do the same thing with Amazon.

Not sure why I didn't just use OneDrive before... I'm paying for Office 365, might as well use it. I won't back up 182GB to it though, just personal file data - about 13GB. At least it isn't an additional expense over what I already pay.

This is the first time I have used Amazon AWS. OneDrive may be cheaper to use as I do a lot of testing installs etc.

 

[Apple_Robert]

@BigMcGuire

I was looking on the Arq site a few ago and see that Polycloud is supported by Arq. 1TB with Polycloud ($47) is cheaper than OneDrive. I decided to go with Polycloud. I don't have to worry about all the extra fees of Amazon AWS, which would have cost me much more.

 

[gilby101]

Not sure why I didn't just use OneDrive before... I'm paying for Office 365, might as well use it.

That is my rational as well. OneDrive is 'free' when paying for Office 365. But, I think there are some differences compared with S3 or S3-like storage. I use both OneDrive and B2 for storage. My concerns about Arq+OneDrive:

I am somewhat doubtful about the durability of OneDrive compared with B2, though I have no real evidence.

With Arq 7 the "Backup and Validate" process is much slower with OneDrive than B2.

Not a real S3-like storage. My limited understanding is that Arq uses a bucket like layer on top of the OneDrive file system.

1TB with Polycloud ($47) is cheaper than OneDrive.

Not if you buy Office 365 anyway! Better to compare Polycloud with B2 and Wasabi for price as they are more comparable with Polycloud regarding functionality.

I will be very interested to hear how you go with Arq+Polycloud.

 

[Apple_Robert]

That is my rational as well. OneDrive is 'free' when paying for Office 365. But, I think there are some differences compared with S3 or S3-like storage. I use both OneDrive and B2 for storage. My concerns about Arq+OneDrive:

I am somewhat doubtful about the durability of OneDrive compared with B2, though I have no real evidence.

With Arq 7 the "Backup and Validate" process is much slower with OneDrive than B2.

Not a real S3-like storage. My limited understanding is that Arq uses a bucket like layer on top of the OneDrive file system.


Not if you buy Office 365 anyway! Better to compare Polycloud with B2 and Wasabi for price as they are more comparable with Polycloud regarding functionality.

I will be very interested to hear how you go with Arq+Polycloud.

I am doing the backup and validate process right now. You are right. It is much slower than standard backup. I don't mind, though. The validate aspect reminds me of the CCC feature, which I appreciate.

 

[BigMcGuire]

BackBlaze gave me a refund $220 - full amount. A+ for their 1 year / 2 year refund policies (within 30 days).

Arq with OneDrive working well so far! Someday I wanna get a full system backup going somewhere.

 

[planteater]

BackBlaze gave me a refund $220 - full amount. A+ for their 1 year / 2 year refund policies (within 30 days).

Arq with OneDrive working well so far! Someday I wanna get a full system backup going somewhere.

Curious, did you make it known to them why you were backing out?

I still like Backblaze. For the most part they do a great job for cloud storage, although with the limitation of a single point of failure being the data center, as their storage is non-distributed. I asked them a while back if they had plans to offer bucket replication to a secondary DC, and they don’t. So going in understanding that limitation, their product is good, for a good price.

As for the tracking issue, I’m sure someone or some team is in the hot seat. I’d like to see them update their production release process with a security checkpoint and sign-off. This must be a big hit to their pride and public persona. I’m sticking with them, as I don’t prefer any of the alternatives for Arq. But I completely see why others chose other options given this blunder.

 

[BigMcGuire]

Curious, did you make it known to them why you were backing out?

I still like Backblaze. For the most part they do a great job for cloud storage, although with the limitation of a single point of failure being the data center, as their storage is non-distributed. I asked them a while back if they had plans to offer bucket replication to a secondary DC, and they don’t. So going in understanding that limitation, their product is good, for a good price.

As for the tracking issue, I’m sure someone or some team is in the hot seat. I’d like to see them update their production release process with a security checkpoint and sign-off. This must be a big hit to their pride and public persona. I’m sticking with them, as I don’t prefer any of the alternatives for Arq. But I completely see why others chose other options given this blunder.

Agreed - I still like BackBlaze too. I did not, I just regretted dumping $220 on 2 unlimited licenses when I was already using B2 with Arq. I'm still using B2. I still like BackBlaze - I'll be honest and say that while it was a factor, it wasn't the main factor in me changing my mind about BackBlaze Unlimited.

I don't have a problem using B2 - encrypted - I still do. I did look around and I agree, I think this was an unintentional slip-up and hopefully they learn from this. I've been using BackBlaze for years now. The competition doesn't look all that great.

I have ~40GB in B2 right now and I think it's like under $.18/mo. lol.

I really want to upload all my data (182GB) somewhere sometime.

 

[planteater]

Agreed - I still like BackBlaze too. I did not, I just regretted dumping $220 on 2 unlimited licenses when I was already using B2 with Arq. I'm still using B2. I still like BackBlaze - I'll be honest and say that while it was a factor, it wasn't the main factor in me changing my mind about BackBlaze Unlimited.

I don't have a problem using B2 - encrypted - I still do. I did look around and I agree, I think this was an unintentional slip-up and hopefully they learn from this. I've been using BackBlaze for years now. The competition doesn't look all that great.

I have ~40GB in B2 right now and I think it's like under $.18/mo. lol.

I really want to upload all my data (182GB) somewhere sometime.

B2 sure is inexpensive. My last bill was a whopping $2.22 for two buckets totaling ~320GB!

 

[Apple_Robert]

In looking at the documentation for version7, (which I find lacking) I am not clear on one aspect.

When wiping your Mac and reinstalling the OS, I take it the Arq settings are saved in the cloud storage location, so that you can inherit the old backup to the new Mac and go about restoring your files?

Clean install of MacOS

install Arq

Point Arq to your storage provider

Expand the menu to show restore and pick the backup you want and click restore

Is that correct?

Edited to add: Anyone know the manual iCloud mail settings for Arq emailing you when there has been an error with the backup? I can't seem to get it to work.

 

[planteater]

In looking at the documentation for version7, (which I find lacking) I am not clear on one aspect.

When wiping your Mac and reinstalling the OS, I take it the Arq settings are saved in the cloud storage location, so that you can inherit the old backup to the new Mac and go about restoring your files?

Clean install of MacOS

install Arq

Point Arq to your storage provider

Expand the menu to show restore and pick the backup you want and click restore

Is that correct?

Edited to add: Anyone know the manual iCloud mail settings for Arq emailing you when there has been an error with the backup? I can't seem to get it to work.

You are correct regarding the restore to a fresh system. All you need are the values for the bucket name, application key ID, and application key, in order to connect. Once the connection is established Arq will pull down and cache its meta data to the local system. I’ve done it on a couple of test systems.

 

[Apple_Robert]

You are correct regarding the restore to a fresh system. All you need are the values for the bucket name, application key ID, and application key, in order to connect. Once the connection is established Arq will pull down and cache its meta data to the local system. I’ve done it on a couple of test systems.

Thank you very much for the reply, PE.

 

[gilby101]

All you need are the values for the bucket name, application key ID, and application key, in order to connect

And your Arq encryption password.
Keep it somewhere not on the computer being backed up.

 

[gilby101]

Anyone know the manual iCloud mail settings for Arq emailing you when there has been an error with the backup? I can't seem to get it to work.

This works for me:

Notes:
1. The @me.com address is really the same as then @icloud and the +arq is to make it easy to do Mail rules. The "To" address can be any valid email address anywhere (but you probably know that!)
2. The password is not the password for your Apple ID, rather it is an "App-Specific Password" which you create in your iCloud settings on this page https://appleid.apple.com/account/manage