Today I needed individual code snippets from a backup. Luckily Samba Backup is still running 
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I think most of the discussion participants do not have a problem with storing an encrypted backup on the NC, but with an encrypted backup stored on the local network.
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Yeah, I know. One of the reasons why GDPR is irrelevant.
The backup feature and HA is not relevant to GDPR
But
The new service that Nabu Casa so generously have added without a price increase has. If Nabu Casa allows non-encrypted data, the requirements on the controls they need to put in place elevates to another level. With enforced encryption, noone in Nabu Casa will have access to your data, not even the server admin. It simplifies the requirement.
Do we want Paulus to spend our subscrition to hire 3-4 people to handle GDPR legal bullshit? No right?
But for any backups that do not go to Nabu Casa I want to use unencrypted. And that is what this Backupgate is mostly about.
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Nabu Casa already stores and processes personal data. Thereās is not difference here. And the cloud storage is secured anyway, has to be secured anyway, regardless if individual files are encrypted or not. Hence why I say itās irrelevant.
Go back and re-evaluate your setup if this was NOT true as it is not plain vanilla HA. Same with me I run Google Backup and technically I canāt suffer from that problem either. But.
All assumptions in design MUST take into account a vanilla install
So if you did not have that or I Google cloud and samba backup. (and before someone says anything about no HA instance is without custom code Iāve heard that too. Thereās no such thing as a non custom Harley Davidson either. But they all work basically the same way and have the same brake system weāre taking fundamentals like wheels here)
If I had a vanilla install, installed no automations or scripts and no addons. I just lost the ability to have unencrypted local backup. (without my own intervention - again you donāt get scripts, vanilla) I also just lost the option to select whether I want a backup snapped when I upgrade. The choices are no longer there and it happened with zero warning. You would not expect upgrades to remove fundamentals (remember no addons)
Yes I CAN add in (insert script or addon or whatever) but with something core to the OS as backup (and yes OS, HAOS is a full OS) you canāt make changes like thatā¦
Say what you want about our typical user base. Itās IT heavyā¦ lots of pros I know use ha as thier home setup because they get it what I see is dev focused people in the thread (devops people) not seeing an issue with it while Ops focused (server and network people) absolutely horrified about the decision. Looks like the miss was looking at backup like a feature of the app not a fundamental service of the OSā¦ It changes the design goals.
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I hope we all still will be! But if the backend, which Auto Backup uses, is changed to encrypted, (which may happen if you read the WHOLE thread), then youāre stuffed like everybody else that just uses the stock backup system.
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Thatās a really excellent point, that blasted right through my blind spot. I understand more now. And I can definitely see the issue with the removal of the snap backups. I will be interested to hear the technical reasoning behind that oneā¦
Yāall keep mixing up the back end componentsā¦
The literal comment was saying that the backend hasnāt changed. And the reference to what could change is not related to the backend at all, but an external api that addons use.
EDIT: Hereās a nice little picture
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Try and list the personal data that NC handles now without backup service.
And after
Before.
Name
Address
Email address
Payment details
List of invoices
Remote login URL
Is that it?
There are GDPR requirments about these. About the same as my hairdressor.
Now we add backup in a version where employess from Nabu Casa, and admin employees from the suppliers of the cloud servers and storage space have access to your data.
Now we add in case of someone similar to me
A full database of
How much electricity I use and when
How many we are in the family
When we leave home and when we come home
Where we go to work
A list of all smart devices incl appliances with smart
Which channels we watch on TV and when
Their names of all in the family
User credientials stored in plain text to Amazon incl the data needed to generate OTP passwords
User credentials to a NAS storage
User credentials to Google for all in the family
The music we listen to
Information about cameras incl credentials to access them
Credentials to Apple account
I could continue
All this elevates the legal liability and the controls of procedures, staff, and service provides for cloud.
There is a heck of a difference between a simple customer database with information that recently was printed in phone books and a credit card number, and managing handling of extreme sensitive information.
The level of controls depend on WHAT you control and process. By not having access to the content of backups NC has a GDPR scope not much different than my hairdressor
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Good visual. Is this an official image?
If so it would immediately defuse the conversation around the core backup services regarding encryption.
However it also suggests that addons MAY not be able to leverage the same. But, do you think there will be an equivalent API/Handler?
I just made it now, but thatās exactly what Frenck and I were talking about.
Yes, the literal comment from frenck was:
However, for the future it is a goal to eventually deprecate those handlers when replacement targets/integrations are available in Home Assistant
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You are making wrong assumptions. The legal requirements for processing 5 types of personal data is the same as when processing 50 or 500 types.
Nabu Casa employees probably have more direct access to the old data than to the new cloud storage. Either way Nabu Casa should already have GDPR officer and follow the regulations, such as right to see, edit and delete the data, and detailed information on what data is stored and why. I donāt know why you pretend they would only have to follow the law now, because they let people store backups in the cloud.
But Iāll stop commenting on this, Iāve just been repeating myself, and you as well.
So, to summarise, the backend is guaranteed to stay the same.
However Addons are not guaranteed to work because HA will cease the API when THEY believe they have an equivalent in the stock system.
Good to know your take in this and thanks for your interpretation, as you are closer to this than we are. Much appreciated.
Pretty much, but there will be a long deprecation period for the addons to use to transition to the equivalent system. Things like that usually have a year deprecation. This of course is if the handler is even deprecated. I would not be surprised if this release thread derails that decision.
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Each time you add a new data type, you add a control. The less you have access to, the less you have to have procedures and actual work for. That is obvious, isnāt it?
Controlling a single customer database on one server, vs controlling tera bytes of data.
Imagine in court proving that you have controls of who has access to a customer database, who has accessed it. Relatively simple. But how many people will have access to tetabytes of backup data stored unencrypted on a cloud storage. Holy shit. You will need controls the same level has Google, Azure, Amazon cloud etc.
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Can we just stop with the GDPR debate. Itās not particularly relevant.
I feel that Nabu Casa are in a much stronger position if they canāt access anyoneās backup, when something goes wrong, and the authorities knock on the door. As such, Nabu Casaās decision to encrypt backups they store on their system is very justifiable.
In contrast, forcing encryption of backups -that are stored on my system - is difficult to justify.
The end
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pure curiosity,
what would prevent one to create a HACS component overriding the current password component and remove the encryption?
THAT is my point. My mission is to set expectations that we should not expect Paulus to accept non encrypted backup on nabu casa storage.
And then focus on getting the choice of non-encrypted or encrypted on non nabucasa backups like our local NAS, USB drives or whatever we have. We have more chance to get a good compromize solution if we are reasonable and understand the situation from the other side
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And itās just in my nature to keep telling people to read (or at least search for relevant info). 
Honestly though, one doesnāt need to read everything. For this specific topic, I tested the summary feature right after the first post and it gave me about 100 posts, which isnāt that bad, and does contain the most important bits of info.
See above: use the summary feature.
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