If you’re a frequent user of Google Docs you might have experienced this today. Many users have taken to social media to report an unexplained Google Docs bug that’s locking them out of their drafts when they try to edit the documents. Not only are they locked out, but they also receive a notification that makes no sense in most cases. The notification warns them that the document they’re trying to edit violates the company’s terms of service.
Google’s abuse policy for Google Drive and Docs mentions that users can’t publish certain types of content that range from hate speech to malware. However, most users who have been facing this issue today are not attempting to distribute either of those two. They’re working on simple documents that don’t carry anything that violates the terms of service.
Google hasn’t said anything about this issue at this point in time so it’s unclear what’s the reason behind this bug.
The official Twitter account for Google Drive does mention that the “team has been made aware and is investigating” the issue. No word as yet on when we can expect a fix to arrive.
DownDetector does report that Google Drive is facing problems in the United States and parts of Europe. Something is certainly the matter and hopefully, Google will provide more clarity about this in the near future.
We understand your concern, James. The team has been made aware and is investigating. Appreciate your patience.
— Google Docs (@googledocs) October 31, 2017
Google has since given a statement:
“This morning, we made a code push that incorrectly flagged a small percentage of Google Docs as abusive, which caused those documents to be automatically blocked. A fix is in place and all users should have full access to their docs. Protecting users from viruses, malware, and other abusive content is central to user safety. We apologize for the disruption and will put processes in place to prevent this from happening again.” — Google spokesperson
Filed in . Read more about Google, Google Docs and Google Drive. Source: gizmodo