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Forum Discussion
Fake activity?
Yesterday I uploaded a movie file to Dropbox for some friends to download. Immediately after, I decided to check from a browser that wasn't logged in, to see what it would look like for them if they didn't have a Dropbox account. I was shocked to discover, under “Activity”: “Patricia Johnson downloaded this file” and “Anthony Abate viewed this file” (neither name recognised by me):
(Not logged in)
So, then I logged in to investigate, but only saw “Traffic and insights: See who’s visiting... Upgrade to Dropbox Professional to start tracking.”:
(Logged in)
Surely this isn’t a scare tactic to get me to upgrade to a paid account, is it??
Hi DoctorDada, thanks for joining the Community!
The image you saw in the first screenshot was an example of what file activity would look like if you were signed into your account.
It doesn't mean that those users were real or accessed the file.
Hope this helps to clarify matters!
Hi, did you create share link or did you share this file with certain people? If you create simple share link you friends could share it with other person. Everyone can see shared link if has the link-code. When you invite certain person only this person can view it. Maybe this is the reason of the strange activity. Ask your friends did they forward this link.
Hi Michał, I just moved the file to a folder in my local Dropbox folder and, when it synched, copied the Dropbox link and sent it to my friends. They definitely didn't forward the link to anyone. And, anyway, I saw those messages within a minute of the file being on Dropbox, so it would be VERY unlikely that two (unknown) people would have found the link and accessed the file that quickly. I believe that Dropbox is lying, that the file wasn't really downloaded and viewed; Dropbox just wanted me to upgrade my account. (In fact I uploaded 3 other files and they all show exactly the same “Activity”.)
Just now I did another experiment: I copied a 3-byte text file to a Dropbox folder, copied the link, opened it in a not-logged-in browser and this is what I saw:
“Viewed 5 hours ago”? I don’t think so!
This is very disappointing.
- Jay
Dropbox Staff
Hi DoctorDada, thanks for joining the Community!
The image you saw in the first screenshot was an example of what file activity would look like if you were signed into your account.
It doesn't mean that those users were real or accessed the file.
Hope this helps to clarify matters!
umm I just got a complaint from one of my customers I sent an exclusive video project to. He was furious! Can Dropbox please remove this whack feature?!?!
- Walter
Hey there Kristy Jessica; thanks for using Dropbox!
We do have a dedicated section on the Community where you can post feature requests or suggest a change on existing features, so I'd recommend posting your idea there so other similar-minded users can provide their own input on this one and up-vote it too to show their interest.
Let us know if you have any questions!
> Hope this helps to clarify matters!
Well, it does clarify now what happened, but it was not at all clear at the time. Don’t you think this should be explained? Otherwise, it just looks dishonest.
My client saw that the file was being viewed by other people, but I did not send the link to this folder to anyone but her.
Can you please tell us what this means? After all, I did not send this link to anyone else.
Thank you in advance for your response.- Lusil
Hey Maria Bogdankova, thanks for reaching out to us.
I've moved your post here, where other users have expressed a similar concern.
When you have a moment, have a look at what is mentioned and don't hesitate to get back to get back to us if you have any other questions.
Thanks again!
This is confusing and was questioned by our CEO on who Patricia and Anthony are.
