A bunch of seemingly random information disappeared from my Mac [closed]

Abstract: I simply found that loads of information had been faraway from my private Mac two months in the past. There’s seemingly no sample to which information are lacking, besides that no folders received deleted and solely directories synched to iCloud Drive had been affected. I think some software program or misconfiguration to be at fault right here, however I am unable to pin it down.

I first found this three weeks in the past when some slides for a previous lecture had been gone. I used to be sceptical, for the reason that empty folder was nonetheless there, however I let it go. Just a few days later I observed extra information lacking and after I inform you my coronary heart dropped. I sat down and went by way of all directories and positive sufficient, about 20% of my filesystem is gone.

Utilizing my backups I used to be capable of collect loads of details about the affected information, and I can inform from the final modified date of affected folders that the information had been eliminated on 10.01.2021 at round 2:00 am. Here’s what I came upon:

Affected Information:

There isn’t any sample concerning the file itself. Affected information are of each doable kind (TXT, PDF, DOCX, PAGES, JPEG, MP4), file names will not be associated (no particular characters and many others.), creation and modification dates vary from December to 4 years in the past. Sizes vary from >2 GB MP4’s to 0 byte txt-files.

Affected Folders:

No folders had been deleted. Information solely went lacking from random subfolders of Paperwork, which is synched to iCloud Drive.

Attention-grabbing Edge Instances:

Usually all information in a selected folder are lacking. However there are some edge circumstances which spotlight the randomness of the deletion. The next folder comprises scans of my old style experiences, the place 6 of 11 information are gone. Discover how varieties, names, sizes and dates are nearly equivalent (there may be additionally 1 Schulnachricht lacking):

Folder containing all information earlier than deletion:

The identical folder after 10.01.2021:

It is a comparable case involving slides from a earlier lecture, had been 7 out of 9 PDFs had been eliminated:

Folder containing all information earlier than deletion:

The identical folder after 10.01.2021:

My Setup:

I’m utilizing a 2018 13-inch MacBook Professional working Massive Sur 11.2.1 (20D74). This machine is backed as much as a Time Capsule utilizing Time Machine. I additionally use a PC working Home windows 10 (20H2) which is synched to iCloud Drive. I realise that the information additionally might have been deleted on my PC and my Mac synched the adjustments. I’ll go down that rabbit gap after I can rule out the Mac because the trigger. I’m the one person of these units and no one else has bodily entry to them.

Regardless that I can restore all of the lacking information I observed by way of the backups, I positively want to research the reason for this occasion. Please throw any concepts you’ve gotten at me, I’m completely satisfied to look into each one in every of them!

Replace:

Whereas restoring my file system from the backup at this time, a doable trigger got here to thoughts. I might need enabled and, after just a few days, disabled optimise Mac storage. Possibly this operation screwed up massively and solely left small information behind, which is how my Paperwork folder shrank from 39 to 2 GB.