Dropbox has made the decision to discontinue its offer of unlimited cloud storage to new customers. The company attributes this change to the misuse of storage space by cryptocurrency miners and other individuals engaged in unethical activities. This alteration marks a setback for users seeking extensive storage options.
In a blog post, Dropbox clarified that the initial intention of the unlimited plan was to cater to businesses operating within shared environments. However, the company expressed dissatisfaction with the practice of users “pooling” their supposedly limitless storage for personal purposes, as well as the resale of storage to third parties. Additionally, the company singled out Chia, a cryptocurrency utilizing a distinctive form of mining apparatus reliant on storage capacity, for contributing to the issue.
Chia diverges from the common proof of work consensus model employed by Bitcoin and the proof of stake model utilized by Ethereum. Instead, it relies on a “proof of space and time” concept centered around storage-based consensus mechanisms. As detailed by Decrypt, Chia eliminates the need for energy-intensive GPUs in crypto mining, which has both environmental and space-related implications. Instead, it rewards users with cryptocurrency based on “plots” of 100 GB storage space allocated on hard drives.
Naturally, the crypto community has attempted to exploit this system by staking plots on cloud storage platforms with swift file transfer capabilities. Some individuals have reported using platforms such as Google Drive and Dropbox for Chia mining.
Dropbox expressed concerns over the increasing prevalence of this behavior, particularly following similar policy changes by other services. This influx of users engaging in excessive storage consumption, in contrast to legitimate business customers, poses a threat to the overall user experience.
To address these challenges, Dropbox is transitioning from an unlimited plan to a “metered” model. The Dropbox Advanced tier will now offer 15 TB of storage capacity, evenly distributed among three licenses. This subscription level typically costs $30 per user per month. Notably, the Advanced tier permits users to purchase up to 1,000 TB of storage space at the upper limit.
Existing subscribers to the Dropbox Advanced tier will retain their current storage allocation, provided it remains below 35 TB, for the next five years. Those companies requiring more than 35 TB will maintain their existing data plan and receive an additional 5 TB for the following year. Dropbox is slated to migrate more companies to new plans by November 1st. New customers seeking Dropbox services will now receive 15 TB of shared storage capacity for a minimum of three users.
Dropbox’s move to limit its once-unlimited storage offering mirrors a trend seen in the cloud storage sector. Google, in recent years, has taken steps to curtail unlimited photo cloud storage. Furthermore, Google shifted to a “pooled storage” approach for business accounts, and shortly thereafter, users who presumed their Google Workspace Enterprise Storage was boundless discovered its limitations.
