Dropbox's new Security Checkup Tool

Martin Brinkmann
Jun 29, 2017
Updated • Aug 30, 2017
Internet
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Dropbox released a Security Checkup Tool for all customers yesterday that users of the service may use to verify security related account settings.

Designed to improve security, it walks you through a series of verification steps. These are not new, but they have been scattered around on the Dropbox website so far.

With the release of the Security Checkup Tool, these become available in one central location which should improve the process for users of the service.

You can run the  Dropbox Security Checkup Tool with a click on the following link: https://www.dropbox.com/security_checkup

Dropbox Security Checkup Tool

dropbox security checkup

The tool has two main purposes:

  1. Data verification to make sure account settings related to security are correct.
  2. Setting a new, secure password for the account.

The program walks you through four or five verification steps. Four if you don't use two-step verification, five if you do.

You are asked to verify the primary email address of the Dropbox account in the first step. While you may have used it to sign in to Dropbox, Dropbox wants to make sure that you have access to the email address. The email address may be used for account recovery purposes for instance.

It gets more interesting in the second step. Dropbox displays a list of devices and browsers that are signed in to the linked Dropbox account. Depending on the age of your account and your devices or browsers, you may see signed in devices listed there that you don't use anymore.

Also, it will reveal devices that you have never had control over, for instance devices by a third-party that managed to gain access to the account.

In my particular case, the oldest device listed was six years old. You can end sessions for any of the devices by clicking on the x-icon next to a device.

dropbox security linked apps

Dropbox's checkup tool displays applications that you have linked to the account in the next step. Each is listed with its name, and a description. Some also provide links for you to click on to look up additional information.

Official Dropbox applications, for instance Dropbox for Windows Store, are revealed as such in the description. The description reveals the permissions for each of the other applications linked to the Dropbox account.

This may include read or write access to a particular folder, or full access to all files inside Dropbox.

You can cut the tie to any of the applications with a click on the x-icon next to it. When you do, a prompt may be displayed which you may use to remove the folder of the application as well from Dropbox.

Once you are done with all of that, you get to the improve your password step. This is an optional step, but Dropbox suggests you change your account password especially if you have removed connected browsers or devices, or linked applications.

If you have enabled two-step verification, you are asked to verify the settings in the final step. Dropbox lists the status and primary means to verify authentication using the extra layer of security.

Once you are done with all of that, you may open the security settings, or simply close the browser tab.

It is interesting to note that you can manage most security related information on the Account Security page directly as well. it offers less information and instructions however.

Closing Words

Dropbox's new Security Checkup Tool adds a straightforward way to Dropbox to verify security related settings of the account, and specifically linked browsers, devices and applications.

Experienced users may speed things up by opening the Security page of the Dropbox account instead, as it provides them with the same verification options.

Now You: Do you check the account security of online services regularly?

Summary
Dropbox's new Security Checkup Tool
Article Name
Dropbox's new Security Checkup Tool
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Dropbox released a Security Checkup Tool for all customers yesterday that users of the service may use to verify security related account settings.
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Ghacks Technology News
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Comments

  1. ilev said on August 4, 2012 at 7:53 pm
    Reply

    Doesn’t Windows 8 know that www. or http:// are passe ?

    1. Martin Brinkmann said on August 4, 2012 at 7:57 pm
      Reply

      Well it is a bit difficulty to distinguish between name.com domains and files for instance.

    2. Leonidas Burton said on September 4, 2023 at 4:51 am
      Reply

      I know a service made by google that is similar to Google bookmarks.
      http://www.google.com/saved

  2. VioletMoon said on August 16, 2023 at 5:26 pm
    Reply

    @Ashwin–Thankful you delighted my comment; who knows how many “gamers” would have disagreed!

  3. Karl said on August 17, 2023 at 10:36 pm
    Reply

    @Martin

    The comments section under this very article (3 comments) is identical to the comments section found under the following article:
    https://www.ghacks.net/2023/08/15/netflix-is-testing-game-streaming-on-tvs-and-computers/

    Not sure what the issue is, but have seen this issue under some other articles recently but did not report it back then.

  4. Anonymous said on August 25, 2023 at 11:44 am
    Reply

    Omg a badge!!!
    Some tangible reward lmao.

    It sucks that redditors are going to love the fuck out of it too.

  5. Scroogled said on August 25, 2023 at 10:57 pm
    Reply

    With the cloud, there is no such thing as unlimited storage or privacy. Stop relying on these tech scums. Purchase your own hardware and develop your own solutions.

    1. lollmaoeven said on August 27, 2023 at 6:24 am
      Reply

      This is a certified reddit cringe moment. Hilarious how the article’s author tries to dress it up like it’s anything more than a png for doing the reddit corporation’s moderation work for free (or for bribes from companies and political groups)

  6. El Duderino said on August 25, 2023 at 11:14 pm
    Reply

    Almost al unlmited services have a real limit.

    And this comment is written on the dropbox article from August 25, 2023.

  7. John G. said on August 26, 2023 at 1:29 am
    Reply

    First comment > @ilev said on August 4, 2012 at 7:53 pm

    For the God’s sake, fix the comments soon please! :[

  8. Kalmly said on August 26, 2023 at 4:42 pm
    Reply

    Yes. Please. Fix the comments.

  9. Kim Schmidt said on September 3, 2023 at 3:42 pm
    Reply

    With Google Chrome, it’s only been 1,500 for some time now.

    Anyone who wants to force me in such a way into buying something that I can get elsewhere for free will certainly never see a single dime from my side. I don’t even know how stupid their marketing department is to impose these limits on users instead of offering a valuable product to the paying faction. But they don’t. Even if you pay, you get something that is also available for free elsewhere.

    The algorithm has also become less and less savvy in terms of e.g. English/German translations. It used to be that the bot could sort of sense what you were trying to say and put it into different colloquialisms, which was even fun because it was like, “I know what you’re trying to say here, how about…” Now it’s in parts too stupid to translate the simplest sentences correctly, and the suggestions it makes are at times as moronic as those made by Google Translations.

    If this is a deep-learning AI that learns from users’ translations and the phrases they choose most often – which, by the way, is a valuable, moneys worthwhile contribution of every free user to this project: They invest their time and texts, thereby providing the necessary data for the AI to do the thing as nicely as they brag about it in the first place – alas, the more unprofessional users discovered the translator, the worse the language of this deep-learning bot has become, the greater the aggregate of linguistically illiterate users has become, and the worse the language of this deep-learning bot has become, as it now learns the drivel of every Tom, Dick and Harry out there, which is why I now get their Mickey Mouse language as suggestions: the inane language of people who can barely spell the alphabet, it seems.

    And as a thank you for our time and effort in helping them and their AI learn, they’ve lowered the limit from what was once 5,000 to now 1,500…? A big “fuck off” from here for that! Not a brass farthing from me for this attitude and behaviour, not in a hundred years.

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