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Hetzner: Data Loss Incident
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Hetzner: Data Loss Incident

Yikes, not a good look...

DATA LOSS INCIDENT (SNAPSHOTS)
Dear Customer,
Unfortunately, we have to inform you that there was a data loss incident that affects a small amount of your snapshots on Hetzner Cloud.
All snapshots you create are stored on our highly available storage systems. The snapshot contents are distributed over multiple internal servers and data is stored in a way that allows up to two separate disks to fail without impacting data integrity.
This means the snapshot can still be accessed, even if two disks fail at the same time.
Due to a recent, very unfortunate series of events in one of our clusters, multiple disks failed in short succession and caused a small number of snapshots to become unavailable.
We immediately tried to recover the affected snapshots but unfortunately the data is lost and we have exhausted all our options.

AFFECTED SNAPSHOTS IN YOUR ACCOUNT:

Project: [redacted]
Name: [redacted]

The snapshots have been removed from our system as they are no longer accessible.
We sincerely hope this doesn’t cause too much trouble for you; we know losing data is the worst-case scenario. Also, we have added 20€ as Cloud Credits to your account (valid for one year). While we know that this will not bring back your data, we still hope that you will accept the gesture.
In response to this we will re-evaluate our snapshot cluster data replication strategies as well as our strategies for replacing disks and rebuilding redundancy after replacement.

Best Regards,
Hetzner Cloud
Thanked by 1darkimmortal
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Comments

  • NekkiNekki Veteran

    Shit happens, backup your backups.

  • wr3ckwr3ck Member

    "very unfortunate series of events" meaning someone fucked up :D

    Thanked by 2Waldo19 arw55
  • MaouniqueMaounique Host Rep, Veteran

    @wr3ck said: "very unfortunate series of events" meaning someone fucked up

    Not necessarily, could simply be an instance of cost cutting, a decision taken calculating the risks and implications. Even without that, nothing is 100% sure. Provider back-ups/snapshots/redundancy/etc all good, but take own backups to increase recovery chances and have a stash away from the provider where they can't cut your access in case they imagine something.

  • cpsdcpsd Member

    Damm it, i am using this functionality as VM templates :neutral:

  • ErisaErisa Member

    I like the way they handled this incident. Everyone affected was given €20 cloud credits without having to ask, along with a concise description of what happened and which snapshot(s) were affected.

    Shit happens, don't rely on one source of truth for your data. Relax and enjoy the free credits.

  • For me Hetzner has been one of the most reliable services I have used so far in many years. I think I only had one incident years ago because of hardware failure. But I always have a paraoid-level backup strategy.

  • that's why experts say backup your backups. so far hetzner and OVH(Kimsufi and SYS) are the most reliable providers to me... well Sh**t happens.

    Thanked by 1Coffee
  • I already have backup storage in hetzner for my servers but I think I need offline backups for my backups

    Thanked by 2Ympker devp
  • TeoMTeoM Member

    So from now on Hetzner lands in tray G for garbage!

    Then rather Google Cloud or any other provider where the data is highly secure.

  • Translation: we sold hard drive with your snapshot to some Romanian on OLX

  • xrzxrz Member
    edited April 2022

    happens

  • All the “backup your backups” comments: there is no way to backup/restore an image. We don’t use images for backups anyway.

    The point of this is not we lost data (we didn’t). The point is that Hetzner doesn’t have backups of their backups, and clearly has real sysops issues.

    Data loss is data loss. It’s not a good look for them.

  • FlorinMarianFlorinMarian Member, Host Rep

    @dane_doherty said:
    Translation: we sold hard drive with your snapshot to some Romanian on OLX

    If you have enough luck you can find your backup on www.hazi.ro (VPS HDD plans).
    P.S. I've never bought an HDD from OLX, and I never will

  • @FlorinMarian said: P.S. I've never bought an HDD from OLX, and I never will

    I know that, hun

    https://streamable.com/us4zwd

  • FlorinMarianFlorinMarian Member, Host Rep

    @dane_doherty said:

    @FlorinMarian said: P.S. I've never bought an HDD from OLX, and I never will

    I know that, hun

    https://streamable.com/us4zwd

    I hope you're not one of those people who thinks I have something in common with Calin. (I personally helped him get out of here)

  • risharderisharde Patron Provider, Veteran

    A 2 disk failing scenario for such a storage system isn't much of plan in my opinion. Sure the services are dirt cheap but if I knew I was putting anything on a storage system in which all it takes is 2 disks failing, for darn sure I wouldn't put anything remotely important on it without backups. I hope their nextcloud instances aren't configured this way because I now began considering using them for thus service.

    Thanked by 10xbkt
  • WebProjectWebProject Host Rep, Veteran

    @Erisa said:
    I like the way they handled this incident. Everyone affected was given €20 cloud credits without having to ask, along with a concise description of what happened and which snapshot(s) were affected.

    Shit happens, don't rely on one source of truth for your data. Relax and enjoy the free credits.

    Without the data some customers don’t need any credit as cost to rebuild project can cost X times more than €20, if current backup/snapshot system fail why not to look for alternative solution.

  • ErisaErisa Member

    @WebProject said:

    @Erisa said:
    I like the way they handled this incident. Everyone affected was given €20 cloud credits without having to ask, along with a concise description of what happened and which snapshot(s) were affected.

    Shit happens, don't rely on one source of truth for your data. Relax and enjoy the free credits.

    Without the data some customers don’t need any credit as cost to rebuild project can cost X times more than €20, if current backup/snapshot system fail why not to look for alternative solution.

    You have unrealistic expectations.

    Thanked by 1Lee
  • Tremendously bad

  • risharderisharde Patron Provider, Veteran

    I just realized after rereading, it means 3 disks failed (I think?)

  • ErisaErisa Member

    @risharde said:
    I just realized after rereading, it means 3 disks failed (I think?)

    Yeah, they say that 2 can fail without issue, and then say that "multiple" failed to cause the incident. As far as I can tell, that means 3 disks failed at once to cause it.

    Thanked by 1risharde
  • @risharde said:
    A 2 disk failing scenario for such a storage system isn't much of plan in my opinion. Sure the services are dirt cheap but if I knew I was putting anything on a storage system in which all it takes is 2 disks failing, for darn sure I wouldn't put anything remotely important on it without backups. I hope their nextcloud instances aren't configured this way because I now began considering using them for thus service.

    Ugh, you probably don't have a single service that can survive three disk failures.

    There's definitely a flaw in their redundancy plan, though.

    Thanked by 2risharde adly
  • @WebProject said:

    @Erisa said:
    I like the way they handled this incident. Everyone affected was given €20 cloud credits without having to ask, along with a concise description of what happened and which snapshot(s) were affected.

    Shit happens, don't rely on one source of truth for your data. Relax and enjoy the free credits.

    Without the data some customers don’t need any credit as cost to rebuild project can cost X times more than €20, if current backup/snapshot system fail why not to look for alternative solution.

    If you think they are incompetent, then move.

    If you think they are capable but not perfect (the best you can hope for), stick with them because I guarantee you that they'll review their processes to prevent this again. If you switch providers, the new one might not have learned this lesson/experience.

    The fact they've identified the issue and it had a financial penalty for them are VERY positive signs that this will be a very rare occurrence.

  • risharderisharde Patron Provider, Veteran

    @TimboJones said:

    @risharde said:
    A 2 disk failing scenario for such a storage system isn't much of plan in my opinion. Sure the services are dirt cheap but if I knew I was putting anything on a storage system in which all it takes is 2 disks failing, for darn sure I wouldn't put anything remotely important on it without backups. I hope their nextcloud instances aren't configured this way because I now began considering using them for thus service.

    Ugh, you probably don't have a single service that can survive three disk failures.

    There's definitely a flaw in their redundancy plan, though.

    Yes, good point indeed!

  • WebProjectWebProject Host Rep, Veteran

    @TimboJones said:

    @WebProject said:

    @Erisa said:
    I like the way they handled this incident. Everyone affected was given €20 cloud credits without having to ask, along with a concise description of what happened and which snapshot(s) were affected.

    Shit happens, don't rely on one source of truth for your data. Relax and enjoy the free credits.

    Without the data some customers don’t need any credit as cost to rebuild project can cost X times more than €20, if current backup/snapshot system fail why not to look for alternative solution.

    If you think they are incompetent, then move.

    If you think they are capable but not perfect (the best you can hope for), stick with them because I guarantee you that they'll review their processes to prevent this again. If you switch providers, the new one might not have learned this lesson/experience.

    The fact they've identified the issue and it had a financial penalty for them are VERY positive signs that this will be a very rare occurrence.

    Haha, we don’t even use them anymore even for their backup services (storage boxes)

  • @TeoM said:
    So from now on Hetzner lands in tray G for garbage!

    Then rather Google Cloud or any other provider where the data is highly secure.

    @risharde said:
    A 2 disk failing scenario for such a storage system isn't much of plan in my opinion. Sure the services are dirt cheap but if I knew I was putting anything on a storage system in which all it takes is 2 disks failing, for darn sure I wouldn't put anything remotely important on it without backups. I hope their nextcloud instances aren't configured this way because I now began considering using them for thus service.

    The Storage Share file system can tolerate several simultaneous drive failures. As soon as we detect any irregularies with our drives, we will exchange them immediately, thereby further decreasing the chance of failure to a very low level.

    In addition, our Storage Share file system checks the integrity of the data using checksums and automatically corrects errors. We've created high-availability cluster for the instance databases, making the chances of a complete failure very minimal. A backup is also performed automatically several times a day. Finally, if you choose to synchronize your Storage Share data with your own computer or device using client software, you will have an additional copy of your data.

    It seems like, unlike the storage box, the storage share (Nextcloud service) is backed up multiple times a day and can sustain "several simultaneous drive failures".

    Thanked by 2Erisa Lee
  • angstromangstrom Moderator

    @opendoor said:
    Tremendously bad

    Bad tremendously

    Congrats on your first post

  • NekkiNekki Veteran

    @opendoor said:
    Tremendously bad

    Another two word bot @FAT32 @Jord @raindog308

    Interestingly, this one also likes their bandwidth being doubled.

  • @opendoor said:
    Tremendously bad

    your post count has been doubled

  • someone fucked up big time .

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