Dropbox Cuts Back on Advanced Plan Storage Limit Due to Cryptocurrency Miners
Dropbox has announced the discontinuation of unlimited storage in its business-oriented Advanced plan due to a rise in dubious activities. In a recent blog post, the company stated that the decision was influenced by the actions of individuals who were utilizing the Advanced plans for purposes such as crypto and Chia mining, unrelated individuals pooling storage for personal use, and even instances of storage resale. This move aligns with similar changes made by other services to restrict storage capacity.
While there are of course legitimate exceptions to unlimited storage plans, Dropbox says bad actors “often consume thousands of times more storage than our genuine business customers, potentially creating an unreliable experience for all of our customers.” It already has policies that prohibit abuse, but the company says creating acceptable usage restrictions is impossible. To do this, Dropbox moves to the meter.
The company will gradually move existing users to the modified Advanced plan starting November 1. Customers will be given at least 30 days’ notice before Dropbox moves them to the new policy.
More than 99 percent of Advanced package customers use less than 35 TB of storage space per license. Dropbox says these teams can continue to use the amount of storage they’re taking up when they receive the move notification, plus an additional 5TB of shared storage for five years without the cost of their current plans going up.
A minority of users who use more than 35 TB of storage per license will receive a similar offer, but for one year. Dropbox is working with them to find a plan that works for everyone in the long term. All add-on subscription versions offer up to 1,000 TB of storage.
Starting today, those who purchase the Advanced package with three licenses will receive a total of 15 TB of shared storage space. Each additional license adds 5 TB of storage space. In addition to this, starting September 18th for new entrants (November 1st for existing users), Dropbox will start offering storage add-ons. These cost $10 per month for 1TB on a monthly payment plan, and $8 per month if purchased annually.
If this all seems necessarily complicated compared to the previous version of the Advanced Plan, there is only one thing to do: blame the crypto debts.
