Dropbox's Jan 1st 2027 terms of service

Dropbox's Jan 1st 2027 terms of service dropbox.com

62 points•simonebrunozzi•11 days ago•112 comments•

#terms #jan #1st #dropboxs #service #dropboxs jan #jan 1st #dropboxs jan 1st

112 comments

big8511 days ago

Major changes:

1. You must be 18 to use Dropbox. Previously, you had to be 13 if in the United States, or 16 if higher. Dropbox may use information "Dropbox may use and rely on information from third parties, including age signals from app stores, for the purpose of enforcing this restriction."

2. Your account may be terminated if you don't have a Paid account and haven't accessed for 6 months. Previously, it was 12 months.

3. If you have multiple accounts tied to the same email address, and one is banned, the others may also be banned.

4. "Refunds are only issued if required by law." -> "Refunds are only issued in limited circumstances or if required by law."

5. You automatically agree to the new terms if you continue to have an account. Previously, it was only if you continued to use the service.

6. Some terms covering Teams accounts.

rpozarickij11 days ago

> Your account may be terminated if you don't have a Paid account and haven't accessed for 6 months

I hope file sync is treated as "access", otherwise this would make me anxious.

helsinkiandrew10 days ago

At least they claim they will give 'reasonable advance notification':

> We’ll provide you with reasonable advance notice via the email address associated with your account to remedy the activity that prompted us to contact you and give you the opportunity to export Your Stuff from our Services. If after such notice you fail to take the steps we ask of you, we’ll terminate or suspend your access to the Services.

prattmic10 days ago

I wonder if they are actually going to start enforcing this. I’ve been receiving emails that my account is at ~200% capacity for a little over 13 years (just went through my email to double check). I’ve logged into my account a handful of times over the years, but certainly not every 12 months.

applfanboysbgon11 days ago

> 5. You automatically agree to the new terms if you continue to have an account.

I would really love to see courts throw this BS out.

necovek11 days ago

I agree with you in principle.

It would also potentially invalidate clauses like the one in GPL license too: "this version or any later version" — how can anyone consent to yet-unknown terms?

In this particular case and going after the summary from big85, there's one case of legal compliance (like age restrictions — it applies in appropriate jurisdictions even if the ToS is not updated) or maybe two (banning per-account vs per-owner), some widening of the terms to the benefit of the customer (like refunds being permitted in "special circumstances" on top of "required by law, with only "reductionist" change being about lowering service window for unused free accounts (in some jurisdictions, even this could be about respecting data privacy laws — companies are obligated to remove any data which is not used after a certain time, though I think this is 12 months even under GDPR).

As such, I believe this would not be a good case where you can bring enough light how this type of clause is harming one side to the contract.

haunter11 days ago

Diffchecker for the save

https://www.diffchecker.com/QD8AKShC/

aurareturn11 days ago

Super useful. Any open source tools like this?

haunter11 days ago

https://diffviewer.vercel.app/v2/diff?id=diff-94626646216089...

https://github.com/technikhil314/offline-diff-viewer

rlk11 days ago

Looks like the major changes are:

- some stuff about Teams that's mostly only relevant if you're using your work email for a personal account

- minimium age 13 -> 18; add "Dropbox may use and rely on information from third parties, including age signals from app stores, for the purpose of enforcing this restriction."

- free accounts may be terminated after 6 months of no use (previously 12 months)

- removed "If you reside in the EU, the European Commission provides for an online dispute resolution platform, which you can access here: https://ec.europa.eu/consumers/odr." from the dispute resolution process.

LoganDark11 days ago

That last point is funny... so arbitration agreements are designed to make the process intentionally more difficult. Can't provide too many hints!

binaryturtle11 days ago

If you leave that in it's actually worse, since the platform was discontinued. I had to fix all my client's projects to remove this stuff. One of those stillborn ideas of the EU.

debugnik11 days ago

I don't think that's the reason. From the linked site:

> The European Online Dispute Resolution (ODR) Platform is discontinued as of 20 July 2025

swiftcoder11 days ago

I guess teenagers don't have any need to sync files, eh? Hate to see this gradual erosion of internet access for young people - I'd bet half the notable members of this very site started their career trajectory by learning how to break/fix computers in middle school or before

ta98811 days ago

It will simply teach them how to go around those "protections". And put them at risk of using shaddy services to do so. Exactly like what happened with the war on drugs...

d0mine11 days ago

It is not about age. It is just a way to tie accounts to a real life identity.

It won't be surprising if the requirement comes from some alphabet agency.

grishka11 days ago

Don't most countries give people their first IDs before 18? Mine does it at 14.

dgellow11 days ago

Dont they already have the payment information?

iLoveOncall11 days ago

This has nothing to do with that. They probably realized that teenagers are a small enough portion of their userbase that the loss of revenue (and probably lack thereof to be fair) is far outweighed by the opportunity to ask users for their ID.

paul798611 days ago

Hmmmmm today is a very different world compared to when we used the Internet to learn how to code. Now with Ai doing all the coding is learning how to code even happenning?

Also, just talked two friends who work for mid-size companies and last week both of their CEOs told them to just point Ai to their Jira tickets to finish all their tasks. Anyone else hearing their CEOs instruct the same thing?

hdgvhicv11 days ago

It’s erosion of closed saas, not the internet. That already broke the hacker environments of yesteryear.

lukeify11 days ago

Amazing Dropbox went from a brilliantly simple service to this stagnating corporate swamp of ooze. Yet another fascinating example of how headcount correlates with quality decline.

bayindirh11 days ago

The pricing got very complicated, that part is true. On the other hand, service quality didn’t go down. They added many small features which makes things easier, on the other hand.

I use a bunch of additional services they offer. They work well, make me spend less money and save my time (e.g.: send, transcription, advanced sharing controls).

financetechbro10 days ago

Dropbox headcount has stayed relative flat since going public… what’s ur point?

microtonal11 days ago

We loved Dropbox and had a family subscription. One of the main reasons we stopped using them (besides it being a US company and Trump threatening declare war to a fellow European NATO ally) was that even though we were paying users, they continuously badgered us with upsells. Using Maestral as a client made things better (at the loss of block-level sync + now unmaintained), but every time I had to log into the web interface I got stupid upsell ads.

I once contacted their customer support about this and their answer was "Oh really? Can you send some examples?" So I sent them screenshots of all the upselling banners, popups, etc. that they showed and I never heard back from them.

It also didn't make sense at all. Why, if I'm using Dropbox for family use, would I upgrade to a business plan?

Read the full thread on Hacker News →

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