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Forum Discussion
My files were deleted, but not everything is coming back, in order to restore them. Why?
Just logged into Dropbox and all my files are deleted. Have most definitely not deleted them myself. I have 2FA on. No sign in notifications received on date that files appear to have been deleted. Subscription all paid up. I have been restoring from Deleted Files folder but not everything is coming back. Has this happened to anyone else?
Hi Flipperchick, yes, desktop means that the deletion was coming from your device.
Now, a few things to ask yourself, and that could have ended up in a deletion is: Did your device experience any hard disk problems around the time of the deletions?
Specifically, do you remember the Dropbox application ending unexpectedly while you were performing changes to your Dropbox? These changes could have that result.
Are you running antivirus software? Antivirus software can occasionally quarantine files. If these files were in your Dropbox, they could have been removed and as a result show as being deleted.
Is your Dropbox in any way pointing towards a non-local disk source such as a network drive or an external drive? If the drive is ever disconnected from the computer while Dropbox is running there is a small chance that the Dropbox software will start deleting files before realizing that the entire drive has been removed.
In any case, we can't exactly identify how the deletion happened, just where it happened from. We're glad you got your content back!
- Nancy
Dropbox Staff
Hi Flipperchick! Sorry to hear about this.
Are you receiving any kind of errors when restoring your files via the website?
Were the files you’re missing personal files or were they previously shared with another user?
That’ll help me guide you further.
- Thank you for your interest. I have managed to restore everything. All files were personal and have never been shared. All okay now. Phew!
- Nancy
- Mark
Super User II
What does www.dropbox.com/events show?
Interesting, I never knew about this Dropbox.com/events option, as I am an infrequent user. It showed that I deleted all my files myself! I just have absolutely no idea how I could possibly have done this. I am under quite a bit of stress at the moment as my mother is in her final days, and my brain is a bit scrambled. However, I genuinely have no idea how I could possibly have deleted the entire contents of my Dropbox in one fell swoop without warning, or being aware of it. I only know how to delete files one at a time.
- Hannah
Hey Flipperchick, I'm really sorry to hear about all this..
Regarding the deletions, now that you've restored the files, what you could do for some additional info, is to check the version history of those files.
There, you should be able to see which computer they were deleted from and when.
- Just happened to me as well. Just a few and was able to recover them, but I definitely did not delete them
- Hannah
Hey 1950bassguy, sorry to hear about this.
As a first thing, can you please make sure that you've signed in to the correct Dropbox account?
If you did, what do you see in your events page about this?
I'm gonna jump in here cause the same thing has happened to me four times now. When I go on the Events page, I see the 30,000 or so files that my external hard drive (connected to my macbook pro) have deleted. I open that list and hit restore and then wait for about 40 minutes. I can solve the problem but it is such an intense time waster and hassle when I sit down to get some work done. And I find it hard to believe that this "just happens when the external drive gets disconnected" (said earlier in this thread by another Dropbox employee). My friend has no problem disconnecting his external hard drive with dropbox stored on it. His files don't delete.
- Mark
Stevecaplan wrote:
Just happened to me as well. Just a few and was able to recover them, but I definitely did not delete themSomething connected to your device did - Dropbox cannot do it on its own.
One thing to check is to go to one of the restored items and click on 'restore previous versions'. Then look where the deletion was initiated from. That device is the one that did it - so is that one using an external drive as an example
- Jay
Hi Stevecaplan, there are many potential reasons for file deletion. This thread can give you some pointers as to where to look, after following the information Mark provided.
