Dude! Where’s My Data?

My faithful readership may remember that I’m not a fan of cloud computing at all.

I feel that it’s just another way to restrict Internet usage, suck up your data, track your habits, and make $$$ for the greedy mega-corps currently circling around one another in the Internet seas seeking fresh meat (you) to gorge upon.

In light of the recent TERMINATION of operation of MegaUpload by Agent Smith and his colleagues, one has to wonder what happens to all the legitimate data that was stored on those servers? Are you one of the unlucky ones who is quite possibly having your private data scoured by the IT department gnomes at BIG BROTHER Central? Disturbing thought, huh?

Sebastian Anthony at ExtremeTech wrote an interesting article about the demise of MegaUpload. Here’s a tidbit:

There have always been two major concerns about cloud services in general, and cloud storage (Dropbox, Megaupload, SkyDrive, iCloud, and so on). The first is privacy: When you upload data to a third party, there’s always the risk that they can look at the contents of your files. Some cloud providers securely encrypt data, but many don’t. The second issue is data security and integrity: Does the third party keep a tight ship against hackers? What happens if a hard drive fails? What protections have the cloud provider put in place to mitigate against natural disasters, bankruptcy, or being shut down by the Feds?

Yes. What happens to your data? Who gets to look at it? The “folly of cloud storage”; it is, indeed.

Rebecca Lipman at The Motley Fool writes:

Government access to cloud computing files
Many note that the timing coincided too conveniently with SOPA online protests. And although SOPA has not passed, the death of Megaupload, which is seen as a kind of victim to the government’s fight against piracy, brings some interesting, if not disturbing, aspects of cloud computing to life.

Get wise, folks. Stop volunteering your personal data to these giant data-sucking companies like Google and Facebook. Keep your personal data where in belongs… in your personal possession; meaning on your own damned system. Drives and drive space are so BIG and cheap these days, you could have your very own server farm in the back room of your house to store all your stuff. You don’t need to be uploading it to Suckle or Slurpbox so they can sift it and then target you with advertisements.

Anywho… that’s just how I feel about this. Y’all have fun now. 🙂

Later…

~Eric

Further reading:

Megaupload’s demise: What happens to your files when a cloud service dies? – ExtremeTech

Popular file-sharing website Megaupload shut down – Yahoo Finance

Feds Shut Down Megaupload: Warning Sign for the Cloud Storage Model? – The Motley Fool