Spideroak One Backup  icon
Spideroak One Backup  icon

Spideroak One Backup

 679 likes

SpiderOak provides an easy, secure and consolidated online backup, storage, access, sharing & sync tool for Windows, macOS, and Linux (Ubuntu, Debian & Fedora). SpiderOak offers a different approach to online backup, synchronization, and sharing.

Spideroak One Backup  screenshot 1

License model

Country of Origin

  • US flagUnited States

Platforms

  • Mac
  • Windows
  • Linux
3.4 / 5 Avg rating (23)
679likes
37comments
0news articles

Features

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Properties

  1.  Security-focused

Features

  1.  End-to-End Encryption
  2.  Encrypted Backup
  3.  File Versioning
  4.  Incremental Backup
  5.  Works Offline
  6.  Unlimited storage
  7.  Selective Synchronization
  8.  Automatic Backup
  9.  File Sync
  10.  Real-time backup
  11.  Synchronization
  12.  Folder Sync

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Spideroak One Backup information

  • Developed by

    US flagSpiderOak, Inc.
  • Licensing

    Proprietary and Commercial product.
  • Pricing

    Subscription ranging between $6 and $29 per month.
  • Rating

    Average rating of 3.4 (23 ratings)
  • Alternatives

    135 alternatives listed
  • Supported Languages

    • English

AlternativeTo Categories

Backup & SyncSecurity & Privacy

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Our users have written 37 comments and reviews about Spideroak One Backup , and it has gotten 679 likes

Spideroak One Backup was added to AlternativeTo by erick125 on Apr 7, 2009 and this page was last updated Oct 25, 2021.

Comments and Reviews

   
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Comment summary: SpiderOak One Backup is praised for its Zero-Knowledge encryption, providing users with strong data privacy. Users appreciate its security features, allowing encrypted backups and file sharing without data exposure risk. However, its interface is considered outdated and not user-friendly, leading to usability concerns. Technical issues, such as excessive CPU usage and slow sync speeds, are frequently cited. Overall, it is valued for security but criticized for performance and interface usability.
Top Positive Comment
John Fastman
Mar 29, 2018
8

Why you need something like this

  • You should have a good system for backing up your data
  • Despite what you might think, Dropbox, Google Drive, iCloud, etc. aren't good services to use for backup.
  • Dropbox, Google Drive, iCloud, etc. aren't very secure and nothing like as private as you deserve.

Why SpiderOak is different (to mainstream services)

Because Dropbox and their ilk use encryption "at rest" only (ie you send them your data, then they encrypt it using keys _they_have). That means they can de-crypt your data, read it, pass it on to others. That means requests for your data from government surveillance agencies become matters of legal dispute. With Spideroak, giving up your data is only a matter of technological impossibility.

Spideroak encrypts your data on your computer, then sends it to their servers. They don't know your passwords, can't read your data. Nice. (Well... they can see what folders you have. But not the files.) What this means is that 1) your data is far more private, 2) if a hacker hacks their servers, it's ok. Because all the hacker will get is stuff he/she can't read.

Spideroak also protects you against ransomware, nasty software that might infect your computer, encrypt your data with its own password and hold it hostage until you pay to get it unlocked. If you have Spideroak, this is no problem. You can restore your data from a version just before the ransomware struck. Easy peasy.

Spideroak's competitors

Key to Spideroak's model is the idea that you hold the key to the encryption. (Don't lose them; use a password manager like Bitwarden to generate and remember it.) Spideroak's competitors in this field are companies that have a "zero-knowledge" architecture (they don't know/can't know what your files are) and therefore can't be compelled to give it away/lose it. They include Sync.com and Tresorit. You can also use Cryptomator to encrypt files before sending them to Dropbox, Google Drive, etc.

Good stuff

  • Spideroak's prices are reasonable. Maybe even good.
  • Supports Windows, Mac, Linux and mobile!
  • Share your files with the outside world via a room (you publish a folder online), and let people download files as you put them in a folder. You can password protect shared rooms. Nice.
  • Backup and sync! Yay!
  • Spideroak supports open source software (e.g. encryptr)

Not so good

  • Really clunky, outdated interface. Takes quite a while to get used to, and it has been a long time ago that it should have been made more user-friendly.
  • No second-factor authentication (the security could be better)... this more than anything is the reason I'm shaving a star off my review.
  • Can't upload files from the mobile app (Tresorit and Sync.com are much better here).

Bottom line:

  • Don't have a backup option? Get Spideroak.
  • Think Google Drive or Dropbox will save you from malware? They won't. Get Spideroak (or Tresorit, if you can afford it.)
  • One of the drawbacks I listed above a problem? Try Tresorit, Sync.com or Cryptomator.
Top Negative Comment
plasbot
Nov 20, 2013
5

Use something like todo-backup to backup your files if you setup syncs using Spider-oak. Spider-oak syncing is slow as molasses. I signed up for 100 gigs and synced up 'my documents' across 3 computers. I installed a new hard drive on my laptop and restored the sync. Of course it took days to sync up, in fact it's still working on it, I'm used to that slowness already. But over 2 days Spideroak systematically deleted 62036 files and 7150 folders, because the laptop didn't have all the files and folders, it decided that I must have deleted everything.

I went into the recycle bin in Spideroak to look for my files and folders, they were there, but there is no way to sort by date deleted column. At the very least, you should have a way to sort by date deleted to make recovering from these disasters not take a full week of plodding through each and ever folder and subfolder.

Luckily I used another product to backup and it was easy to restore the files. Using spideroak recycle bin would have been a mind-numbingly slow and cumbersome process. The warning about 'exact file structure' when restoring a sync needs to be clarified, why can't it just say 'if you have some folders and files missing on this new pc we are going to delete them from all your other pc's"

LLLinuX4400
May 4, 2024
1

This back-up service was good 3 to 5 years ago but has become less reliable in recent years and the company has shifted away from cloud storage services. File uploads sometimes work fine and other times can take days to sync a few MB of data. The offered at one time unlimited storage for $125/yr, which was a good value years ago. Their desktop client software hasn’t been updated since 2019. See \[https://spideroak.com/release-notes/\](https://spideroak.com/release-notes/)

SpiderOak One has been down completely for scheduled maintenance since about 23 April 2024 and is still down as of 4 May 2024.

romanio412
Jan 22, 2024
1

I just had a look at this service:

  • no mobile app (it was removed from the Play store 3 years ago and since then things haven't progressed really https://spideroak.support/hc/en-us/articles/360052262171-Mobile-Applications-currently-un-available);
  • no search across files and folders in any of the apps;
  • the web-version doesn't even adapt to the mobile screen;
  • cumbersome UI, hard to get used to and not very intuitive; completely different design code in the UI on Desktop and Web version;
  • a few overlapping concepts with the differences between them that are very hard to understand — backup, sync, hive. Additional screen to manage the folders. Can't it all be converged into just one view? This is unintuitive.
  • didn't find an option to enable 2FA.
  • I uploaded ~200 MB of data as a test and it suspiciously took about 2 minutes. This is a lot, I have a very fast uplink. I couldn't tell though whether this time was spent encrypting or actually uploading.

I liked the pricing and the end-to-end encryption, but the aforementioned things make it useless for me.

sandkeeper
Jun 17, 2020
1

I don't think it's discontinued like the listing says, as my backup is still going, but the development does seem to have slowed to a crawl.

Each month I get a notification that my billing is overdue when it isn't - I know this because they're still charging me - and the iOS app is basically useless. And when I say 'useless', I mean 'doesn't function at all', not just 'severely limited in functionality'.

I also don't like that they charge EU customers VAT without any notification whatsoever, so my $6 per month is actually $7.20 and I didn't realise this until I checked out my billing agreement recently. I get that they're legally required to add tax, but they're also legally required (in my jurisdiction) to show it in the price.

The only reason I'm still with them is that I haven't found a decent encrypted backup service... most of the main competitors are file sync services.

fxckster
Nov 28, 2019
2

I, like others, wanted to love this software. For a time it was great, and I did feel good about it. Recently there was a problem, it stopped doing backups and continually reported it was "disconnected". I contacted support, and their recommendation was to move app data and sync folders and try to "reinstall" the system. Well, that didn't work either.

The command line utilities might have their uses, but are really poorly, and strangely, made. When you run one under windows, it exits immediately and somehow manages to echo stdout back into the console that started it.

So basically, there is a blocking problem, and there is no indication from the UI what it is. There are no logs, or troubleshooting/debug commands. Support doesn't have any idea what is going on.

Knowing this, I know for no reason why anyone should trust this software with their data.

Guest
Jan 23, 2019
-4

SpiderOak is so great !!! Wish the trial lasts longer, anyway i will buy it soon..

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What is Spideroak One Backup ?

SpiderOak provides an easy, secure and consolidated online backup, storage, access, sharing & sync tool for Windows, macOS, and Linux (Ubuntu, Debian & Fedora). SpiderOak offers a different approach to online backup, synchronization, and sharing. This difference is not just measured in our zero-knowledge privacy policy - the first one ever employed in this setting - but also in our flexible design in handling data from all platforms (Mac, Windows, Linux) and locations (external drives, network volumes, USB keys) in one centralized account.

A Sync may exist between any two or more folders including two folders that exist as part of the same machine (e.g. between a desktop and an external hard-drive). The 5.0 series have introduced the SpiderOak Hive folder. Any items placed inside Hive will automatically upload and then sync to all your other devices (thus effectively replicating the Dropbox folder).

Note: While SpiderOak was formerly a free service, plans currently start at $6/month or $69/year. A 21-day free trial is available.

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