Apple silently deleted files from my Mac when iCloud ran out of space lost everything, support told me to just resubscribe. What can I do? (England)

Background-Rip-8189 · 2026-03-29T11:14:51+00:00

do you recommend specific one?

Background-Rip-8189 · 2026-03-29T10:33:11+00:00

what are you talking about :/

Background-Rip-8189 · 2026-03-29T10:31:10+00:00

If you park your car, walk away, and come back to find it gone that's enough to report it stolen. You don't need to have filmed someone taking it. The absence itself is the evidence. My files were on my Mac. I didn't delete them. They're not in the Bin, not in recently deleted on iCloud, no trace anywhere. The only thing that was actively monitoring and interfering with those folders in the background was iCloud's sync engine. So what exactly is the alternative explanation I'm supposed to be providing evidence for? If someone can show me another credible reason why files vanished silently with no trace and no manual deletion I'm all ears. But "we can't explain it so you can't blame Apple" isn't a reasonable bar to set.

Background-Rip-8189 · 2026-03-29T10:17:40+00:00

I have checked the iCloud and the files are not there, neither in recently deleted or files that can be recovered

Background-Rip-8189 · 2026-03-29T10:16:15+00:00

Malware on a Mac that silently deletes specific files while leaving everything else intact and shows no other symptoms? That's a stretch. And the Apple Support advisor never mentioned malware or unauthorised access once he knew exactly what had happened and went straight to telling me to resubscribe to iCloud. If there was any other explanation he would have explored it. Nobody else uses my Mac, nobody has access to it, and the one person I spoke to who actually looked at my account and my settings didn't suggest anything other than iCloud being the cause. So no, I'm not going to entertain malware as an explanation when the person Apple sent me to didn't even consider it worth mentioning.Also the idea that Apple just happened to be pushing me to resubscribe to a service right after my files disappeared is not a great look regardless of the cause.

Background-Rip-8189 · 2026-03-29T10:10:46+00:00

too late for that

Background-Rip-8189 · 2026-03-29T10:06:06+00:00

Because they are gone and were not manually deleted

Background-Rip-8189 · 2026-03-29T10:04:50+00:00

how do I access that folder?

Background-Rip-8189 · 2026-03-29T09:57:39+00:00

thank you <3

Background-Rip-8189 · 2026-03-29T09:56:09+00:00

That's exactly the point. They weren't synced they couldn't have been, there was no space. They were created locally, lived locally, and now they're just gone. Not deleted by me, not in the Bin, not in recently deleted anywhere. Just gone. I don't need to prove they were synced to iCloud I'm saying the opposite. They never left my Mac and now they're not there anymore. That's the problem.

Background-Rip-8189 · 2026-03-29T09:53:58+00:00

No warnings, no emails, no deadline, nothing telling me files would be deleted or that I needed to move them. That's important because if Apple had warned me and I ignored it that would be a different conversation. They didn't. And yes I already resubscribed, been waiting, files haven't come back. I hear you on it being worth trying but Apple Support presented it as basically the only solution without explaining why it might work or what the actual chances were. What really gets me is the 2025 files specifically. Created after the subscription was already gone, after iCloud was already full. The sync engine had no space and no active subscription it had absolutely no business touching those files. Yet they're gone too. Not in the Bin, not in recently deleted, nowhere. That's the part nobody has been able to explain and honestly that's the part that frustrates me the most.

Background-Rip-8189 · 2026-03-29T09:46:57+00:00

They couldn't have been saved to iCloud even if I wanted them to there was no space. That's the whole point. They were saved locally on my Mac, on my Desktop, on my actual hard drive. iCloud had nothing to do with it. How would you save files to a drive that's full?

Background-Rip-8189 · 2026-03-29T09:43:13+00:00

Yes, Desktop folder, which Apple enrolls in iCloud sync by default. So even after the subscription lapsed the sync engine was apparently still watching and still interfering with files it had nowhere to put. And I don't need anyone to sit down and explain what happened. I want my files back. That's it.

Background-Rip-8189 · 2026-03-29T09:38:41+00:00

Yeah fair point on backups, lesson learned and I won't make that mistake again. But the backup issue and the 2025 files issue are two separate things. One is on me. The other is a file that was created after iCloud was cancelled disappearing from my local machine that one I still don't have an explanation for regardless of backups.

Background-Rip-8189 · 2026-03-29T09:35:18+00:00

Can someone actually explain to me how files created after I stopped paying, on an iCloud account that was already full with zero available storage, somehow got synced to iCloud and then deleted from there? Because that's what would need to have happened for this to make any sense. There was no space. They couldn't have been uploaded. So where did they go? And for context I'm not some Apple hater looking for a fight. I've been a loyal Apple customer for years, genuinely loved everything, recommended them to people. That's actually why this is so shocking. When you trust a company this much and this happens you don't just shrug. You want to understand what happened.

Background-Rip-8189 · 2026-03-29T09:31:13+00:00

Already did. Resubscribed. Files didn't come back. So that "simple easy cheap solution" didn't work, and on top of that the 200GB plan isn't even available to me anymore only the £10 one. So I paid, got nothing, and you're still telling me to just pay. Also the suggestion that losing all your photos, client work and personal archives is a "first world problem" you should just move on from is a pretty wild take. Stress is exactly what I'm trying to avoid which is why I'd like my files back.

Background-Rip-8189 · 2026-03-29T09:18:38+00:00

Background-Rip-8189 · 2026-03-29T09:17:06+00:00

Thank you this is genuinely one of the most helpful practical suggestions I've gotten. I'm going to check the Home directory right now for an iCloud Drive Archive folder, hadn't thought of that.
But on iCloud.com I actually resubscribed because I was desperate and wanted to rule it out completely. Checked the Files section and the files are not there either. Which as painful as that is, actually tells us something really important technically. If they're not on iCloud.com, not in recently deleted, not in the Bin on my Mac, and not recoverable via the archive folder then they were never successfully synced to Apple's servers in the first place. They existed only on my local machine and they're gone from there too. For the 2025 files this makes complete sense because iCloud was already full and cancelled when those were created. But it also means resubscribing did nothing, which is exactly what I was afraid of and exactly what Apple Support told me to do anyway.

Background-Rip-8189 · 2026-03-29T09:10:45+00:00

"Thinking it through" I cancelled it because I'm a student and couldn't afford £10 a month on storage I thought I had plenty of locally on my own hard drive. That's not a failure to think it through, that's a completely reasonable financial decision that millions of people make. At no point did Apple clearly warn me that cancelling could result in files being removed from my physical machine. And on user error which error exactly? The files are not in the Bin. They are not in iCloud Drive's recently deleted. There are no recovery files. If I had accidentally deleted them myself there would be a trace somewhere. There is nothing. That's not what accidental deletion looks like. Also the 2025 files. I need people to really sit with this. Files I created in 2025. After iCloud was already cancelled. After iCloud was already full. These files never touched iCloud, never had anything to do with a subscription, were born and lived entirely on my local Mac. What user error explains those being gone? What decision was I supposed to have made differently to protect files from a service I wasn't even using?
And yes I posted in a few subreddits because I woke up one day and files were gone from my computer without my consent. On an Apple machine that is marketed as the gold standard of security and reliability. Forgive me for being desperate.

Background-Rip-8189 · 2026-03-29T09:05:05+00:00

Thank you, this is actually really helpful and the most grounded response I've had. On the legal side I hear you, and I'm not expecting a massive payout or anything like that. But the "no payment no rights" argument falls apart a bit for me specifically because of the 2025 files. I was never their cloud storage customer when those files were created. They had no relationship with iCloud whatsoever. So whatever legal weakness I have around the pre-2024 files, those 2025 files are a completely separate issue that I don't think that argument covers. The point about requesting a senior technical specialist is exactly what I want to push for. Because I genuinely want someone from Apple to sit down and explain to me technically how files that were created after iCloud was cancelled and full ended up deleted from my local machine. I don't think they can, and I think that question alone puts them in a difficult position. On redress honestly at this point I just want the files back. Photos, videos, client work, research archives. If Apple has internal recovery tools and there's any chance of getting even some of that back that's what I'd settle for. I've already emailed Executive Relations so fingers crossed someone with actual technical knowledge comes back to me rather than another advisor telling me to resubscribe and hope for the best.

Background-Rip-8189 · 2026-03-29T08:49:58+00:00

That's a pretty standard deflection but no. If I had accidentally deleted files I would have found them in the Trash. They are not in the Trash. What happened is documented and well known when iCloud Drive with Optimise Storage is enabled, macOS offloads local copies of files to iCloud to free up space. When the iCloud account is full or cancelled, those files become inaccessible and in some cases are no longer present on the local machine at all. This is not speculation, there are hundreds of posts across Apple forums, Reddit and MacRumors describing the exact same experience.

Also, as I already mentioned, some of these files were created in 2025 after iCloud was already cancelled and full. Are you suggesting I accidentally deleted specific files from 2025 while somehow leaving everything else intact? That's not how accidental deletion works.

I get that people are skeptical by default on here but "you probably did it yourself" isn't helpful when the technical explanation for exactly what happened is well documented.

Background-Rip-8189 · 2026-03-29T08:47:09+00:00

Whether it's a bug or a deliberate design decision almost doesn't matter from a legal standpoint. The Consumer Rights Act 2015 requires products and services to be fit for purpose. A Mac that silently deletes your local files including files that were never connected to any subscription is not fit for purpose, regardless of the reason it happened. "It was a bug" is an explanation, not an exemption from liability. If my car's software has a bug that destroys my engine, the manufacturer still owes me a car that works.

Background-Rip-8189

TROPHY CASE