Google has offered a fix for users of their Google Drive cloud offering who claim that they have lost files, including ‘months of important data’.
Affected users claim that their files could not be located, while others said important documents have been vanishing on a regular basis.
Users have been cautioned that a previous fix did not work, and the new offering may also be a problem, and one that could create more problems for users of the Google Drive which has more than 2 billion active monthly users.
Google claims that the problem involves only a “small subset” of individuals who had a defective version.
Users are being cautioned as the process is complex and could fail.
To attempt the fix, Google suggests users download the most recent desktop version of Drive onto their Mac or Windows PC.
There they will find a recovery tool under the Drive icon in the menu bar or system tray.
After downloading and opening the latest version of Google Drive for Windows or macOS, Google says to run the app’s recovery tool.
- To do this, click the Drive icon in the menu bar or system tray. From there, press and hold Shift, click Settings, and select “Recover from backups.”
- If all goes well, you’ll receive a notice that says “Recovery has started.” Google will put all the recovered files into a new folder named “Google Drive recovery” once the process is complete.
- Users should also ensure that there is enough space for the missing files; if there is not, an error message will show, and space will need to be made for the lost files.
If these fixes do not work, Google has directed users to go to the support pages for the next steps.
