Dropbox unveils new features: Passwords, document vault, backup

Dropbox unveiled several new features to help users keep life organized and keep work moving. Life has become more chaotic than ever, with work and home tasks blending together like never before. Dropbox wants to help users get more organized at home and at work so they can focus on what matters.

“The lines between work and home are blurred, and we’re all being pulled in a million directions right now. It can feel chaotic and overwhelming,” said Drew Houston, CEO of Dropbox. “We’re working quickly to provide new features to help people stay better organized in all aspects of their lives so they can focus on what really matters—like health and family.”

“According to IDC survey data, 31% of workers are concerned about lost productivity due to shifting to work from home,” said IDC analyst, Holly Muscolino, Research VP, Content Strategies and the Future of Work.

“However, a recent poll shows that 70% of organizations would be investing in content sharing and collaboration over the next 12 months to support at-home workers. With today’s announcement, Dropbox has created a single place to help users get better organized at work and at home, to help them stay productive.”

New features for home

Dropbox is introducing new Dropbox Plus features to help users better manage personal life essentials. These new features include:

• Dropbox Passwords—The result of Dropbox’s acquisition of Valt last year, Dropbox Passwords allows users to seamlessly log in to websites and apps by storing passwords and syncing them across devices with zero-knowledge encryption.
• Dropbox Vault—Secures and organizes users’ most important documents and allows them to grant emergency access to select friends or family, so only their loved ones can access the files when needed. Vault offers an additional layer of security, including a 6-digit PIN, on top of Dropbox’s existing best-of-breed security features.
• Computer backup—Automatically backs up users’ Mac or PC folders to Dropbox for secure access on-the-go and retrieval even when hardware fails or is lost.

The features are available in beta to new Dropbox Plus users on mobile as of today, and will become available to all existing Dropbox Plus users in the coming weeks. Computer backup is also available to Dropbox Basic and Professional users now.

Dropbox also announced plans to introduce Dropbox Family, a new plan for up to six members with individual account views and logins with unified billing to keep things simple. The plan will allow users to create a shared Family space to make family photos and important family documents available to all members.

Each individual member will also have space to privately store their files, in addition to all Dropbox Plus features. Dropbox Family will become available to Dropbox Plus users in the next few weeks, and to everyone later this year.

New features for work

Dropbox also unveiled new features and workflows to better support distributed teams, including:

• HelloSign eSignature embedded as a native feature within Dropbox, bringing the joint value proposition of HelloSign and Dropbox to life. The integrated user experience is the first of its kind, and makes HelloSign the default eSignature solution within Dropbox. This new workflow enables users to easily send, securely sign, and safely store their most important agreements without leaving Dropbox. This functionality will begin rolling out to users in private beta in the coming weeks, and will become generally available to all users in the next month.
• Dropbox App Center gives users a centralized place to discover and connect best-of-breed tools from Dropbox partners including Zoom, Slack, and Google. The App Center is available to a subset of users in beta with 40+ integrated partners, and more partners coming soon.

As it gets more challenging for people to stay organized in their personal lives and at work, a unified platform that allows people to stay organized in both arenas will help users control their time and focus on important priorities.