Photos are some of the most important files we store on a daily basis. In 2021 alone, 1.4 trillion photos were taken, and the vast majority (90.6%) were taken on cell phones.
If you don’t back up your photos to the cloud and then lose your phone or it breaks, your photos will be lost forever. While it is possible to recover photos from damaged phones or storage devices, it is difficult and expensive. It’s much easier to regularly back up to the cloud to keep your photos safe.
Other benefits of online photo backup are that you can easily view your photos from all devices (phone, computer, tablet, etc.) and share them easily.
Moreover, the use of online storage to back up your photos is that cloud providers are redundant. This simply means that if something happens to your home, your files will remain safe on a remote server somewhere online.
What’s important when choosing cloud storage?
If you’re looking for online storage for your photos, here’s a list of features and factors to consider.
Storage capacity
The vast majority of storage providers charge based on the amount of storage you are given, and only a few offer “unlimited” storage. To choose a package that fits your budget, it’s important to understand how much storage you need.
Photos taken on an iPhone and saved in HEIC format typically take between 1.5 and 3.5 MB, while JPGs from an Android phone are around 3 MB.
Security and privacy
One of the main concerns for people using online storage is the possibility that their photos could be hacked and leaked or ransomed. Although this has happened to some celebrities, this problem is now a thing of the past.
Private encryption for complete privacy
Some providers take it a step further by guaranteeing you “Zero Knowledge” private encryption. Simply put, photos are encrypted before they even leave your device. But more importantly, the key used to encrypt and decrypt the data is known only to you. In practical terms, this means that no one but you can decrypt and therefore view your photos and videos.
A good online storage provider should also be concerned about privacy, giving you peace of mind that your photos will not be viewed or shared with third parties. This is exactly what private encryption offers.
Unfortunately, too few cloud providers offer private encryption, and certainly not GAFAM, who dominate the market, or Dropbox. To ensure your data is completely private, you should look at alternatives such as pCloud.
For more information, check out our guide to cloud storage security.
Ease of use
Finally, the service should be easy to use. An important feature for many people is the ability to automatically synchronize photos so that they are saved as soon as you take them.