Google Drive is flagging some macOS files for copyright violation

Some macOS end users seeking to add their individual information to Google’s cloud storage services have been met with copyright violation notices.
A disgruntled Reddit user a short while ago described that a ‘.DS_Store’ file on their Google Generate was flagged by the lookup giant for violating its copyright infringement coverage. Seemingly, this just isn’t the first time this concern has been encountered as macOS people also documented dealing with very similar complications very last month.
For those unfamiliar, .DS_Retail outlet is a metadata file that Apple people may possibly see when transferring folders and archives from macOS to other working devices these types of as Home windows or Linux. MacOS’s Finder immediately generates these styles of information to retail outlet tailor made characteristics and metadata like icon facts and the area of background photographs. Finder then makes use of this details to render a layout according to a user’s tastes.
Most of the time, .DS_Shop documents are concealed in just finder in the exact same way that desktop.ini and thumbs.db documents are concealed on Windows 10 and Windows 11. Even so, Microsoft’s Explorer does have configurations that enable users to see these ‘hidden’ files.
No recognized bring about
At this time, it still unclear as to why Google Travel is flagging DS_Retail outlet documents for copyright infringement when uploaded to a user’s cloud storage.
Whilst BleepingComputer was unable to reproduce the problem, the information outlet believes that Google relying on checksums to keep monitor of copyright material could have led to a prospective hash-collision. If a copyrighted file and a usual file share the very same hash it could cause these false violations.
A identical incident transpired a short while ago when Google Drive unintentionally flagged nearly empty documents made up of just a number of numbers for violating the company’s copyright infringement data files. In accordance to a Google spokesperson who spoke with the information outlet, the corporation learned and preset the difficulty that only affected a smaller range of Drive information back in January.
If your files have been improperly flagged for copyright violation by Google, never fear as the corporation is conscious of the challenge and a repair ought to arrive quickly.
By using BleepingComputer