TIL my backup drive was silently corrupting files for 8 months

This is a long body.

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The 3-2-1 backup rule gets thrown around a lot, but it's like people assume the copying process itself is bulletproof. I've seen it with photos on my phone too, where I think I've got them saved somewhere but it turns out the sync just quietly failed. It's that whole thing where we trust the routine instead of checking the actual result, you know? Like flossing, you do it out of habit but never really confirm your gums are good until the dentist says something. Your post is a perfect example of why I now randomly open files from my backups every few months, just to make sure they're not empty or full of garbage. The scary part is that silent failure is way worse than a loud crash, because at least a crash forces you to act.