There are several reasons why you could prefer Wuala over dropbox.
First of all Dropbox has a general problem with security due to its design. In addion there have been other issues, like the Authentification Bug in June 2011 or troubles around the terms of service.
Wuala takes a complete different approach on security. The files are encrypted (AES) and split up into multiple chunks on the client side and afterwards transferred to distributed datacenters. There are several other points why Wuala is a strong alternative to dropbox mentioned on lifehacker.
If you install Wuala via this referrer link you start with 2GB instead of 1GB.
Several other promo codes increase your starting space:
PC-MAGAZIN (2 GB)
I-KNOW-MARCEL (1 GB)
I-KNOW-FABIUS (1 GB)
I-KNOW-DOMINIK (1 GB)
I-KNOW-CAROLA (1 GB)
All these codes expire after 1 year!
Another surplus over dropbox is that you’re able to share some of space of your harddrive. Depending on the amount of space and your online time you gain additional space. You could even install the Wuala client (java) on your dedicated root server and donate some space in order to get the same amount (in my case 50G) of space for your account..
The Wuala Client is available for Linux/Windows/MAC. The recent updates to the mobile clients were necessary and the new iPad Version is also available. In addition the usual iOS/Android Client wait’s in your appstore.
For small and medium sized companies the guys from LaCie grant a decent business offer: 279€ for 100GB and 5 user per year.
The downside of Wuala currently is that it’s not as easily managed as dropbox and that the client isn’t integrated as deeply as dropbox into your operating system.
Hi Andreas!
I came to the same conclusion (e.g. loosing your promos after just one year is a major downside to me) and therefore decided to apply my own encryption to dropbox – on my client computers. As I wanted to use an easy to use solution, I finally found out that EncFS is a good and secure encryption tool to use.
See here how I’ve done it (in German): http://blog.bmarwell.de/2011/10/16/dropbox-ordner-mit-encfs-verschluesseln/
Hope that helps.
Thanks, nice tutorial.
But you don’t have the chance to view the encrypted files on mobile devices, or?
I don’t think so – yet. It’s still good for me, because I don’t want my personal/private files flying around unencrypted on my mobile anyway.
But it’s okay on my desktop (which doesn’t move) and on my laptop (which has LUKS encryption). See my point? My mobile is too risky to get lost or stolen, as it has an unencrypted file system and is easily movable.
That is why i switched from Dropbox to Wuala, because my data is encrypted and available mobile.
I see your point, but i don’t put this kind of files in a cloud storage. At least not in one i can’t control.