Is Cloud Storage Safe?

Today, which is March 10, 2015, Xbox Live is having problems with the Xbox 360. People are having trouble logging into Xbox Live. I was playing Final Fantasy XIII yesterday and I have been dumb enough to be using cloud storage. Now that Xbox Live is down for me, I have to start a new game of Final Fantasy XIII because I don't have access to my save file.

What happens if I want to play a game like Grand Theft Auto V in the future, but cloud storage has been emptied or discontinued for the Xbox 360? Will I have to start my game over again then, too?

Check out this article.

Xbox Live has had regular issues for months. In December, Call of Duty players reported issues downloading certain items that they had purchased. That problem took weeks to fix. Around Christmas, a cyberattack brought down both Xbox Live and PlayStation Network. In recent days, Xbox 360 owners have had more issues downloading themes and pictures for their profiles.

The errors range from minor to catastrophic and they often affect both Xbox 360 and Xbox One. Today’s outage, at least for now, is limited to the older system.

Xbox Live Down for Many

How much longer will the Xbox 360 be supported by technical support? How much longer will it be able to sign into Xbox Live and use cloud storage? Even Netflix is affected by this outage. I use a 360 because I own a large game collection for it that is not playable on the Xbox One, and it allows me to access Netflix.

If I had to upgrade to an Xbox One just to use Xbox Live without interrupted service, I would lose the ability to play the games that I have purchased with my own money, many of which I haven't played yet.

I think the simple answer is that I shouldn't be using cloud storage. There is no guarantee of how long it will even be available for the 360, thus I could lose precious save files in the foreseeable future. In addition, these Xbox Live outages could become more frequent, thus making playing games harder.

Ah, the wonderful little signs, symptoms, & tastes of what a full scale technogical shut down would do to our daily lives.

a reply to: Eunuchorn

There is a bigger issue here, this is just a taste as you said. We are so reliant on networking and cloud storage that an outage like this on a different scale could seriously affect peoples' daily lives.

Now imagine, if people are storing all of their information online, how permanent is that online storage? This might not just be a problem for us in the future, but for future historians, as well.

For example, I store my photos on Facebook under the assumption that Facebook will never go away. My grandfather stored his printed photos in photo albums, which remained decades after they were taken and are still around today. Will I be able to share my Facebook photos with my grandchildren?

I enable both local and cloud storage. The cloud saved some of my stuff the last time my local drive died on me, but if the cloud isn't working ... then my local is the life saver. And let's be honest, there are some things you don't want on a cloud because the cloud isn't yours.

a reply to: darkbake

No, of course it isn't safe. How much more do you want to give the NSA and other intel community members? If it's just for gaming, well, safe yeah, reliable, uh probably not. If it's for sensitive or personal information, not safe at all. Wow, I am just shocked this question was even asked LOL.

Cheers - Dave

Yes, amend the above to say local and cloud for gaming.

a reply to: darkbake

HAAAAAAAA! I remember when I 1st heard of "online storage" for us! Only XXX$ per month! Then 'the CLOUD". Yeah. Right. Im gonna give my stuff to either of those to "hold stuff safe" for me. Right.

Speaking about a gaming perspective, for save games at least... A combination of local save files and cloud storage is a great combination. When you only have a cloud option, it is a terrible idea. That way, when service is down you can continue anyway from your local save, then when connection is reestablished it should sync the files again with your most recent local save. Then when you play on a new system you can then continue where you left off and establish a new local save. The only thing clouds ate good for is migrating to a new system or transferring files to another system in general. Oh, and never personal stuff.

All this new cloud stuff is frightening. I fear the day when household computers become "obsolete" because your computer needs could be satisfied by paying a monthly fee for a cloud computer where you just need a terminal connected to the internet, where all the terminals are run from some server... It's like socialism for computers, and it doesn't feel right.

a reply to: Aldakoopa

The private stuff is what you have an external HD for. It's just for the personal important stuff you don't want on a public cloud, but you really don't need to have your gaming stuff on that kind of HD. The cloud works just fine for that kind of transitory stuff.

originally posted by: darkbake
a reply to: Eunuchorn

There is a bigger issue here, this is just a taste as you said. We are so reliant on networking and cloud storage that an outage like this on a different scale could seriously affect peoples' daily lives.

Now imagine, if people are storing all of their information online, how permanent is that online storage? This might not just be a problem for us in the future, but for future historians, as well.

For example, I store my photos on Facebook under the assumption that Facebook will never go away. My grandfather stored his printed photos in photo albums, which remained decades after they were taken and are still around today. Will I be able to share my Facebook photos with my grandchildren?

You are so right. I don't trust cloud storage for anything important to me personally.
I'm actually working on making photo books and giving them to my children and grandchildren, for just the reason you stated. All the photos on my computers, even though triple backed up don't do anyone any good if they can't read them. Anything on the cloud is worthless if you can't access the internet. We certainly found out what a problem that can be when our electricity went out for a week a few years ago due to weather.

Don't trust the cloud for anything you really care about.

originally posted by: Aldakoopa
All this new cloud stuff is frightening. I fear the day when household computers become "obsolete" because your computer needs could be satisfied by paying a monthly fee for a cloud computer where you just need a terminal connected to the internet, where all the terminals are run from some server... It's like socialism for computers, and it doesn't feel right.

That's where consoles are heading quite soon. All the processing power will be done from a network.
I'm also conservative when it comes to computers and games.

The problem is the trend of dumbing down, removing options and "simplifying" which probably became popular because of Apple products. I find it quite scary to have a future with computers with barely no options, no access to system files...the death of the power user.

I don't trust clouds with my information, sure it can be a useful function but I would never feel safe with JUST a cloud just like I don't feel safe without backups.