The Good Tech Companies - Sia Proposes ‘Supreme Privacy’ Framework to Address Cloud Data Access Vulnerabilities

Episode Date: June 4, 2025

This story was originally published on HackerNoon at: https://hackernoon.com/sia-proposes-supreme-privacy-framework-to-address-cloud-data-access-vulnerabilities. Sia offers Supreme Privacy, a model where your data is encrypted, sharded, and stored in such a way that no one but you can access it. Check more stories related to web3 at: https://hackernoon.com/c/web3. You can also check exclusive content about #web3, #cybersecurity, #data-privacy, #decentralization, #encrypted-cloud-file-storage, #zero-trust-cloud-storage, #protect-data-from-cloud-hosts, #good-company, and more. This story was written by: @siafoundation. Learn more about this writer by checking @siafoundation's about page, and for more stories, please visit hackernoon.com. Sia offers Supreme Privacy, a model where your data is encrypted, sharded, and stored in such a way that no one but you can access it. In a follow-up post, we’ll examine how Sia builds on this foundation to offer Impenetrable Security.

This audio is presented by Hacker Noon, where anyone can learn anything about any technology. SIA proposes, Supreme Privacy Framework to address cloud data access vulnerabilities, by SIA Foundation. When it comes to protecting your data in the cloud, the conversation is often dominated by security, firewalls, access controls, and encryption protocols designed to keep bad actors out. But what if the real danger isn't just outsiders breaking in but insiders already having access? What if your data was never private to begin with? At SIA, we acknowledge that proper data protection begins not with impenetrable defenses but

with supreme privacy. A model where your data is encrypted, fragmented, and stored in such a way that no one but you can access it. This article explores what supreme privacy means, contrasts it with traditional notions of cloud security, and examines how SIA avoids the real-world privacy failures that have plagued conventional cloud storage providers. In a follow-up post, we'll examine how SIA builds on this foundation to offer impenetrable security. Privacy and security are often conflated, but they serve different purposes.

Security is about defending your data from tampering, corruption, or theft, it's reactive. Most cloud providers focus their efforts here, locking the gates and patching vulnerabilities, all while retaining visibility into your files. Privacy, however, takes a proactive approach. It ensures that your data remains inaccessible to everyone except you. It's not just about building stronger walls, it's about eliminating the possibility of any single entity accessing your data. It prevents mass data exposure from negligence or malicious intent and removes any incentive

for providers to misuse or monetize the data they store. To understand why this matters, we can look at the failures traditional cloud providers have faced in safeguarding user privacy. In 2014, a security lapse in Apple's iCloud service led to the leak of private photos from numerous celebrities. Attackers used phishing and brute force techniques to gain access, but the deeper issue was that once inside, the files were readily viewable because they had not been encrypted end-to-end. Squared Dropbox suffered a similar incident in 2011 when a bug temporarily allowed access

to any account without a password. Cubed to the power of 4 even beyond bugs and breaches, some platforms, like Google, have used user data for commercial gain. Until 2017, Google scanned Gmail content's toe-target users with ads, a practice that only ceased after public backlash. To the power of 5 to the power of 6 HTTPS colon slash slash www. YouTube, com, watch? V equals 28 EWDYIZQZG and embeddable equals true these are not fringe cases. They're symptomatic of a model that ensures storage providers have access and control over their users' data.

It is this fundamental flaw in the design that SIA aims to correct. SIA's design begins with client-side encryption. Files are encrypted on your device before they leave it, meaning only you possess the decryption keys. After encryption, SIA fragments each file into 30 pieces using erasure coding, ensuring redundancy and resiliency. These fragments are then encrypted once more before being distributed across a decentralized network of hosts around the globe. This process means that no single host possesses enough information to reconstruct a file,

nor can they read the fragment they do store. With SIA, even if attackers breached individual hosts, the fragmented, encrypted data would remain incomprehensible and useless. This architecture eliminates the need for trust, meaning there is no centralized authority with the power, or liability, to access your files. There is no metadata leakage, no account-based identity tracking, and no single point of failure. Even if someone wanted to subpoena or hack into your files, there is nothing to find. Compared to traditional providers like Dropbox or Google Drive, which rely on centralized infrastructure, log user activity, and often have access to plaintext data, SIA

offers a dramatically different proposition. Privacy isn't a toggle, it's the default. Greater than privacy is not a luxury, it's a prerequisite for digital sovereignty. SIA does greater than not require you to trust your data with anyone, not even us. It's important to note that ensuring data privacy does not mean ignoring security. Quite the opposite. Privacy is the foundation upon which effective security is built. Without privacy, any security measure is merely reactive, a patch on a system that already assumes visibility. By ensuring that your data is not accessible to any centralized entity, CIA virtually eliminates the opportunity for attacks. This protects your files not only

from malicious actors but also from the very entities hosting or facilitating the storage. In our next article, we'll examine how SIA builds impenetrable security on top of this privacy-centric architecture. While supreme privacy ensures your data is invisible and inaccessible, impenetrable security ensures it is immutable, resilient, and verifiably protected against failure or manipulation. Together, these two pillars define a new paradigm for decentralized cloud storage, one where your data is truly yours. References 1. Fung, B. 2014, September 2nd. Apple's basically blaming hack victims for not securing their own iCloud accounts. The Washington Post. https://www.washingtonpost.com.news.theswitch.wp.

The 2nd of September 2014, Apple's basically blaming hack victims for not securing their own iCloud accounts. 2. Louis, D. 2014, September 2nd. iCloud data breach. Hacking and celebrity photos. Forbes. 3. For Dowsie, A. 2011, June 20. Yesterday's Authentication Bug, The Dropbox Blog. https://blog.dropbox.com, index.php. Yesterday's Authentication Bug. 4. Concade, J. 2011, June 20. Dropbox Security bug made passwords optional for 4 hours. TechCrunch.https://techcrunch.com 20th June 2011 Dropbox security bug made passwords optional for 4 hours.

5. Fung. B. 2017. June 26. Gmail will no longer snoop on your emails for advertising purposes. The Washington Post. https://www.washingtonpost.com, News, The Switch, WP, 26 June 2017. Gmail will no longer snoop on your emails for advertising purposes. 6. Wakabayashi, D. 2017, June 23. Google will no longer scan Gmail for ad targeting. The New York Times, HTTPS colon slash slash www.nytimes.com, the 23rd of June 2017, Technology, Gmail ads.

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