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Photos have been deleted from an iPhone which had iCloud Photo Library turned on so photos were deleted from iCloud as well. Does Apple store backups of iCloud to restore its state at a previous date ?

Feflechi
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    How long ago was this? When I delete photos they go into a deleted folder for a month before being removed – GammaGames Jun 17 '20 at 22:10
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    Phil Schiller's meant to every other weekend, but he always forgets to plug the Drobo into the Mac mini before he leaves the office ‍♂️ – Paul D. Waite Jun 19 '20 at 09:21

4 Answers4

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Does Apple make backups of iCloud?

From an infrastructure management perspective, yes they do. However, it’s not something consumers can access alone and it’s not something Apple support staff and engineers can access alone. Their backups are for service continuity; if something on their servers crash, they can be to and running again. They also have some automation in case people inadvertently make a choice to delete files not realizing that deletion is permanent. Due to how the encryption keys are stored, you would need to create a support pin and then explicitly give Apple consent and a key to unlock your files. Think of a bank offering to store your lock box in their vault. They can look at your box, but may not have the key to open it.

Can you access this back up? No. It’s not for users. In fact, every Apple account is encrypted meaning Apple can’t make sense of the files without your help.

From the customer perspective (yours) iCloud is a synchronization service. If you delete photos, it’s assumed you wanted them gone. Now, you can use iCloud for your own backups, but that’s something you have to setup and manage (For example, my iPhone is backed up to iCloud including photos on it).

IMO, iCloud is good, but not as mature as OneDrive or Azure. In those services, not only do I get the synchronization services like iCloud, but I can purchase a backup plan and even specify where I want it (I could be in the east coast of the US and my data gets backed up to the west coast or even Europe!)

Personally, when it comes to Photos, I have them in the cloud, on my NAS and then backed up from the NAS to a USB drive, so 3 places. Having your own backup is the ideal case as you would not depend on support for recovering files you could have backed up.

bmike
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Allan
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  • every Apple account is encrypted meaning Apple can’t access it at all I thought iCloud was not e2e? https://discussions.apple.com/thread/250326515 – Michel Antoine Jun 18 '20 at 09:01
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    @MichelAntoine you ate confusing encryption between iCloud servers and the client (your Mac, for example) with encryption of the data itself on those servers. I’m referring to the latter. – Allan Jun 18 '20 at 10:21
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    Old Salty Sys Admin saying: If it doesn't exist in at least 3 places, then it never really existed at all. – SnakeDoc Jun 18 '20 at 16:24
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    From what I have heard, Apple has a "magic switch" that can recover photos that were deleted even from the "Recently Deleted" folder source, so in this way they do have a "backup" of the photos, provided OP has removed them in the last 40 days. Am I misunderstanding what you are saying? – Oion Akif Jun 18 '20 at 17:02
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    Reddit is an “iffy” source so take what they say with a heavy grain of salt. There is a recycle bin function that’s built into iCloud, but it’s not backup. You have X number of days to undelete whatever you deleted then it’s gone. It’s very different from a back up. It’s closer to your Trash on your Mac. – Allan Jun 18 '20 at 17:10
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    "(I could be in the east coast of the US and my data gets backed up to the west coast or even Europe!)" Great for those pesky asteroid strikes – Asteroids With Wings Jun 18 '20 at 19:07
  • @Allan I don't think I'm confusing e2ee and server side encryption. If the files are encrypted at rest but not e2ee then Apple can access them. – Michel Antoine Jun 19 '20 at 11:40
  • @MichelAntoine e2e or end-to-end encryption is encryption of the communication between two parties so that it cannot be read by others. That has nothing to do with the encryption of the data itsekf on the server. – Allan Jun 19 '20 at 13:02
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    I'm sure Apple could pull data from their backup snapshots to recover user-deleted content, but I'd doubt there is any automation in place to make this happen by magic. It would require manual intervention by a systems administrator and would be rather expensive. I suspect if you offered them enough money and/or had a really good story (that makes the news headlines...) then you might have a chance that they would go out of their way to do it for you. If you just deleted "really important" cat pictures that you want back... forget about it. – J... Jun 19 '20 at 18:52
  • @Allan Exactly. The point being that a party has to encrypt the data itself if it wants to be the only one who can read it. In this case iCloud does not encrypt the data before sending it to Apple's servers thus the claim every Apple account is encrypted meaning Apple can’t access it at all is false. This link https://support.apple.com/en-ca/HT202303 clearly states that Apple cannot read your health data because it's e2ee (between you and yourself) but nothing prevents Apple from looking at your pictures or reading your iCloud files. – Michel Antoine Jun 20 '20 at 12:46
  • From the link you supplied: iCloud secures your information by encrypting it when it's in transit.. and to give you context, they use that sentence *directly after* they finish their introduction paragraph with the line ...is leading the industry by adopting privacy-preserving technologies like end-to-end encryption for your data. @MichelAntoine I understand you want e2e to mean what you think it means, but the fact is, it doesn't. Please, take this as an opportunity to learn and move on. – Allan Jun 20 '20 at 13:07
  • @Allan Ok so just correct me if I'm wrong. The data is encrypted both in transit and at rest yet Apple cannot read it but the owner can? – Michel Antoine Jun 20 '20 at 13:18
  • e2e encryption is an encrypted tunnel between two parties so that whatever is transmitted is encrypted so outside parties cannot see it. You could literally send your password in plain text on an e2e encryption, the only two parties that can see it is you and the other person. Where you're confusing this is that the data that resides on the server is encrypted with a key only you have which is how Apple can't see it. – Allan Jun 20 '20 at 13:27
  • So, to make it short: You encrypt the data which only you can see, then create an end to end path of encryption only you and Apple can see and then store it on a server volume encrypted with a key that only you can see. – Allan Jun 20 '20 at 13:29
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    See the thing I don't get is that the link doesn't mention the first step You encrypt the data which only you can see. It certainly states For certain sensitive information, Apple uses end-to-end encryption.. So I understand that Apple cannot read my health data yet I don't get what prevents Apple from looking at my photos or iCloud files... – Michel Antoine Jun 20 '20 at 13:36
  • When you open a bank account and they give you an instruction sheet, do they go into how you made the money? Apple doesn't care whether you encrypt or not because they have no control over that. They control the connection so that's encrypted. See my sentence about "plain text password." – Allan Jun 20 '20 at 13:37
  • Ah my bad I totally missed your first comment. Then yes I understand what an encrypted tunnel is... I also understand that it's using TLS and Apple's certificate... Which means that only Apple can receive and decrypt the files. Nothing here mentions that the files where encrypted (by the owner's private key) BEFORE going into the tunnel. – Michel Antoine Jun 20 '20 at 13:44
  • Actually that's even simpler than that: Your data is protected with a key derived from information unique to your device, combined with your device passcode, which only you know. I cannot access my Apple Health data from my browser because it has no device unique id but I can look at my photos and access my iCloud files from any browser (even on a windows PC) because they're not e2ee. Thus if I can do that Apple can do it too. Also from January 2020: https://9to5mac.com/2020/01/21/apple-reportedly-abandoned-end-to-end-icloud/ – Michel Antoine Jun 20 '20 at 13:49
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Not sure whether it's officially known if Apple does or doesn't make backups of the data stored in iCloud (I would assume they do). But even if they do there is no enduser access to it so you can't use it to recover lost data.

You may be able to get your photos back from the "Recently Deleted" album within Photos if the deletion took place in the past 30 days (and you didn't empty the album manually).

PS: It's important to keep in mind that iCloud basically is a syncing solution, not a backup solution. So having a dedicated backup in addition to it is always recommended.

nohillside
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    In some sense, a syncing solution is the opposite of a backup: if you accidentally delete something, it makes sure, it is deleted everywhere. – Jörg W Mittag Jun 17 '20 at 18:43
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    @JörgWMittag That's a very common trap I see people fall into. Thinking that automated rsync scripts or RAID are a backup, when in fact they're just incredibly effective ways to make sure a ransom ware attack, bit flip, accidental edit or delete are synced everywhere. – Alexander Jun 18 '20 at 13:02
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    @Alexander-ReinstateMonica: See also Why is RAID not a backup? on [sf]. – Jörg W Mittag Jun 19 '20 at 06:22
  • @Alexander-ReinstateMonica does any ransomware attack foil rsync used with the --backup flag? Wouldn't an rsync run on the backup/destination server, that is, where the source to be backed up is a remote host, and the destination is local would be even harder to nigh impossible for a (in the general case, of a fully automated) ransomware attack to foil (Note: sure, you're left with a mix of old and new, but they're organized, not a mess.) (Second question should perhaps be its own question!? Perhaps, but far from an entirely novel question! https://stackexchange.com/search?q=rsync+ransomware ) – WHO'sNoToOldRx4Covid-CENSORED Aug 02 '20 at 21:03
  • @MatthewElvey Yeah, that sounds like it should be fine, from what little I understand about the --backup flag – Alexander Aug 02 '20 at 21:16
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Apple support engineers do have access to longer retention and backups even if you intentionally take action to delete all photos, then delete them from the deleted items section and dismiss the warnings that may present.

I would not count on them having a long time period (weeks or longer would be long) to help rescue your photos and would contact them as soon as you can if you discover you don’t have a local backup of the photos that are now deleted or if your library becomes corrupted.

bmike
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Thank you for clarification and recommendations. The problem indeed is that Apple offers both a synching service and backups through the same cloud and that is misleading users. The worst part is that if one doesn't use iCloud Photo Library (presumably photos are then only on 1 device) then photos are included in the backup...

Feflechi
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    Not sure how this answer the question you've asked. Please have a look at https://apple.stackexchange.com/help/someone-answers for what to do if your question gets answers. – nohillside Jun 19 '20 at 11:03