online file sharing services like
dropbox and google drive and box are
terrific but there is one major concern
we all share or should share and that is
how well do they respect our privacy and
the answer
hmm is there a better online file
sharing service that does offer privacy
perhaps i may have found it it's called
sync i'll show it to you today
on dottotech
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steve dotto here how the heck you doing
this fine day it is good to be talking
to you today about online file sharing
services now i'm a huge fan we've done
multiple videos on a variety of
different tools like dropbox and google
drive i love the functionality and the
convenience that online file sharing
services provide for us but i've always
had this little voice in the back of my
mind sometimes it's a loud voice that
says
steve
exactly how secure is your data on these
services and i'm speaking about privacy
how private is your data on these
services and i
kind of have ignored this voice for a
long time but no more because i have
found a solution that respects my
privacy online it's called sync and it
is a canadian company it's like me it
lives here in canada and their prime
directive is to respect our privacy well
the prime directive is probably to
actually be an outstanding file sharing
service like the others technically
allowing us to store files share files
access our files but
overriding all of this is the issue of
privacy and is it a big issue i think it
is
i'm going to put a link here if you want
to just jump to the demo and see exactly
uh how the tool works
but before we do that for the rest of
you let's have a wee conversation about
privacy now
the folks at sync have summarized things
for us quite nicely in a white paper
where they talk about privacy and they
tell us exactly how the different main
services respect our privacy and you can
have a quick read through this i'm not
going to dive too deeply into it except
that things like this should probably
concern you take a look this is
dropbox's own terms of service currently
on the website as of the beginning of
april 2019. let's read this paragraph
it's right up at the top
we need your permission to do things
like hosting your stuff backing it up
and sharing it when you ask us to our
services also provide you with features
like photo thumbnails document previews
commenting easy sorting editing sharing
and searching these and other features
may require our systems to access
store
and scan your stuff i say again
to access store and scan your stuff
you give us permission to do these
things and this permission it gets
better extends to our affiliates and
trusted third parties we work with
we have the right to scan your stuff to
look through it and at our discretion
says dropbox we have the right to extend
that
courtesy
to our affiliates and other third
parties we work with
does that cause you pause it caused me
pause when i really thought about it and
most of the other services do the same
kind of thing where's the big difference
with sync
sync doesn't allow anybody to see any of
your data we'll look at the technical
aspects of how it all works and how it
works as a file sharing service in a few
moments but the key as far as this demo
here is concerned is
sync encrypts your data at source as
soon as you upload a file to sync it's
encrypted and only you have the
decryption key so even if somebody else
gets a hold of your data it's useless to
them because they don't have the
encryption key
that's number one number two sync
servers are located in canada where we
have very powerful privacy laws and they
respect all of those laws
so other nations asking for access to
your information even if it's totally
legit in that nation doesn't carry any
weight here in canada so the answer is
no no no not today go looking elsewhere
for this person's data your data your
stuff is secure with sync and at the end
of the day that's the bottom line all of
the services are going to do a good job
of uploading and downloading files
allowing you to share files with others
but i don't know of any other service
that's going to protect your privacy the
way that sync does
is it worth having a look now at the
tool
if you're still with me let's have a wee
gander at sync
just one quick disclaimer before we move
ahead is i have signed up as an
affiliate for sync myself i like the
service a lot so if you use one of my
links that's in the description below or
in the blog post you will be using my
affiliate link and should you purchase
it i will be compensated thought you
should know that should you purchase it
i say thank you very much
let me take you on a quick tour through
sync itself so sync being an online file
sharing service has a couple of
different aspects we have the web-based
version of it that we can access through
our web browser but we can also install
a desktop application or an application
on each of our devices that allows us to
access all of the data we share you're
probably familiar with these sort of
file sharing services before you
probably use dropbox or google drive or
another service and sync is going to
have some remarkable similarities to
those services because they all work in
essentially the same way and here's how
the model works
on your local desktop you have a folder
that has all of the files that you want
to sync that you want to have access to
online any files you drag into that
folder are going to be automatically
synced or copied to the online servers
that then allow you to access those same
files from other devices that's
essentially how online file sharing
works now you can designate some of
those files as shared files so that you
can share them with others so with a
simple web link they can then access or
download those files themselves and that
gives you some really nice functionality
as far as sharing your data and
basically managing all of your different
processes that you have with your team
or family so that is essentially how the
system works now again the difference
with sync is as soon as you upload a
file that file is encrypted so the file
that's online is useless to anybody
unless they have the decryption key
which you have or anybody who you are
sharing the file with has access to as
well now there's two different ways
there's more than two different ways
there's probably three or four different
ways that you can manage all of your
different sync files so the first is let
me just close i'll see i'll show you in
the browser you can open up
your sync account in a web browser in
any web browser you can log in and you
have access to manage your entire sync
account here from the web browser so i
have all of my administration files now
stored on sync and that's actually my
things like my tax documents and things
other documents that i would never have
considered storing online before but
because of sync's encryption i now feel
comfortable with the entire process and
i'm also using sync for sharing our
videos because i get a lot of storage
with sync so with my team members as
we're editing videos like the video that
you're looking at right here we're
sharing all of our files back and forth
with sync it's got very fast upload and
download servers and so we're finding it
to be a really good tool for sharing our
video editing files so that's those the
purposes that i'm using it for but you
can see here that i can manage them all
from this web browser interface but i
also when i installed sync downloaded a
desktop app now it appears here in the
toolbar in the very top of my mac and
it'll be the same in your windows world
and this is where we can actually choose
to open the folder and control all of
the different aspects of sync through
the desktop app now the folder that we
see here is the folder that is going to
be synced to the desktop from the
desktop to the cloud so any files that i
drag and drop in here are going to be
then shared onto the online service and
from there i can manage exactly how i
want to use those files and to work with
those files we also
can go into the preferences and
determine where
our local home folder is stored so we
can choose you can choose to put it on
an external drive or in a different
location so whatever is convenient for
you for your own process and you can
manage all of the other account settings
such as changing your password checking
if you have large files that are being
uploaded or downloaded on the progress
of those files and in the advanced
features you can go and you can
determine exactly which files are going
to be synced to the online service and
which ones are just going to be stored
locally now where this is important or
is important with other services is if
you were to say just take your entire
documents folder and store it in the
sync folder which a lot of people do if
you did that there might be some files
that you choose not to sync to the cloud
that would have been for with other
services because of privacy concerns or
it might be because of size concerns
because you just don't want to have
these large files being transferred back
and forth you can determine all of that
from this panel
privacy concerns are increasingly
relevant and the services that you sign
up for and choose to trust
you've always got to be careful as local
laws change in your community in the
community you live in that reflect the
services that you are working with and
here's one of the areas that sync really
shows its some of its strengths is it is
currently compliant with all of the
different privacy laws in the world
including gdpr and all of the other
privacy
legislation that is occurring at least
in the western world that we know about
at this particular point
and recognizing philosophically how sync
approaches privacy i think you can feel
very secure that moving ahead as
countries create new privacy laws that
sync is going to be one of your best
opportunities to be in compliance and
you're not going to have to change your
systems when the laws change with you or
with your clients with other people who
you're dealing with
you and i both know that there are so
many good services for providing online
file sharing and backup and and they all
work really well
sync is their equal technically with all
of the other services but it does two
things that none of the other services
do the first thing it does is it
protects your privacy
aggressively the second thing it does is
it allows you to pay in canadian money
which means you will actually end up
saving money those are pretty two
compelling reasons to have a good solid
look at sync
now here at dottotech we make technology
easy so you can do more and i hope that
you found our video today to be useful
and one thing that i really look forward
to is your comments and suggestions
below if you've got other products that
you want me to take a look at let me
know in the comments and tell me what
you think of sync or your online file
sharing service
until next time i'm steve dotto
have fun storming the castle
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