Microsoft banned me for using Duplicati on Onedrive

Support
1

Last week my Microsoft Account where I do backups was banned with no motivation. I had just set up Duplicati on that account because my main one was full. The backup copied about 25% of the data when the backup stopped and the account was closed. I was able to restore my access by filling out a form and waiting a day. Duplicati gave this error:

Duplicati.Library.Interface.UserInformationException: Impossibile autorizzare l'utilizzo del servizio OAuth: Server error. Se il problema persiste, prova a generare un nuovo token da: https://duplicati-oauth-handler.appspot.com?type=onedrivev2 ---> System.Net.WebException: The remote server returned an error: (500) Internal Server Error.
  at System.Net.HttpWebRequest.GetResponseFromData (System.Net.WebResponseStream stream, System.Threading.CancellationToken cancellationToken) [0x00146] in <91935ad653254a93b9d73a9f8f2f7a2d>:0 
  at System.Net.HttpWebRequest.RunWithTimeoutWorker[T] (System.Threading.Tasks.Task`1[TResult] workerTask, System.Int32 timeout, System.Action abort, System.Func`1[TResult] aborted, System.Threading.CancellationTokenSource cts) [0x000f8] in <91935ad653254a93b9d73a9f8f2f7a2d>:0 
  at Duplicati.Library.Utility.AsyncHttpRequest+AsyncWrapper.GetResponseOrStream () [0x0004d] in <2a3ee711c7c04f6c957360f2cf183a7f>:0 
  at Duplicati.Library.Utility.AsyncHttpRequest.GetResponse () [0x00044] in <2a3ee711c7c04f6c957360f2cf183a7f>:0 
  at Duplicati.Library.JSONWebHelper.GetResponse (Duplicati.Library.Utility.AsyncHttpRequest req, System.Object requestdata) [0x000c9] in <fd6b26d6c1004933aab594493968119c>:0 
  at Duplicati.Library.JSONWebHelper.ReadJSONResponse[T] (Duplicati.Library.Utility.AsyncHttpRequest req, System.Object requestdata) [0x00000] in <fd6b26d6c1004933aab594493968119c>:0 
  at Duplicati.Library.JSONWebHelper.ReadJSONResponse[T] (System.Net.HttpWebRequest req, System.Object requestdata) [0x00007] in <fd6b26d6c1004933aab594493968119c>:0 
  at Duplicati.Library.OAuthHelper.GetTokenResponse[T] () [0x00040] in <fd6b26d6c1004933aab594493968119c>:0 
  at Duplicati.Library.OAuthHelper.get_AccessToken () [0x0002f] in <fd6b26d6c1004933aab594493968119c>:0 
   --- End of inner exception stack trace ---
  at Duplicati.Library.Main.BackendManager.List () [0x00049] in <e60bc008dd1b454d861cfacbdd3760b9>:0 
  at Duplicati.Library.Main.Operation.FilelistProcessor.RemoteListAnalysis (Duplicati.Library.Main.BackendManager backend, Duplicati.Library.Main.Options options, Duplicati.Library.Main.Database.LocalDatabase database, Duplicati.Library.Main.IBackendWriter log, System.Collections.Generic.IEnumerable`1[T] protectedFiles) [0x0000d] in <e60bc008dd1b454d861cfacbdd3760b9>:0 
  at Duplicati.Library.Main.Operation.FilelistProcessor.VerifyRemoteList (Duplicati.Library.Main.BackendManager backend, Duplicati.Library.Main.Options options, Duplicati.Library.Main.Database.LocalDatabase database, Duplicati.Library.Main.IBackendWriter log, System.Collections.Generic.IEnumerable`1[T] protectedFiles) [0x00000] in <e60bc008dd1b454d861cfacbdd3760b9>:0 
  at Duplicati.Library.Main.Operation.BackupHandler.PreBackupVerify (Duplicati.Library.Main.BackendManager backend, System.String protectedfile) [0x0011d] in <e60bc008dd1b454d861cfacbdd3760b9>:0 
  at Duplicati.Library.Main.Operation.BackupHandler.RunAsync (System.String[] sources, Duplicati.Library.Utility.IFilter filter, System.Threading.CancellationToken token) [0x01048] in <e60bc008dd1b454d861cfacbdd3760b9>:0 
  at CoCoL.ChannelExtensions.WaitForTaskOrThrow (System.Threading.Tasks.Task task) [0x00050] in <9a758ff4db6c48d6b3d4d0e5c2adf6d1>:0 
  at Duplicati.Library.Main.Operation.BackupHandler.Run (System.String[] sources, Duplicati.Library.Utility.IFilter filter, System.Threading.CancellationToken token) [0x00009] in <e60bc008dd1b454d861cfacbdd3760b9>:0 
  at Duplicati.Library.Main.Controller+<>c__DisplayClass14_0.<Backup>b__0 (Duplicati.Library.Main.BackupResults result) [0x0004b] in <e60bc008dd1b454d861cfacbdd3760b9>:0 
  at Duplicati.Library.Main.Controller.RunAction[T] (T result, System.String[]& paths, Duplicati.Library.Utility.IFilter& filter, System.Action`1[T] method) [0x0026f] in <e60bc008dd1b454d861cfacbdd3760b9>:0 
  at Duplicati.Library.Main.Controller.Backup (System.String[] inputsources, Duplicati.Library.Utility.IFilter filter) [0x00074] in <e60bc008dd1b454d861cfacbdd3760b9>:0 
  at Duplicati.Server.Runner.Run (Duplicati.Server.Runner+IRunnerData data, System.Boolean fromQueue) [0x00349] in <156011ea63b34859b4073abdbf0b1573>:0

Now I had to regenerate the OAuth Token and it seems to work. Have you any idea of why this happened? I suspect because I was overusing Onedrive by loading 600 GB of backups on it.

2

Now it stopped working again, but Microsoft hasn’t banned me yet.

3

How exactly did they inform you last time, tell you why, and lead you to the form that you filled out?

I don’t think we have much familiarity with their practices (which they won’t describe in great detail).

I’ve tried some research, but you might as well say how yours looked. Was browser login stopped?

The remote server returned an error: (500) Internal Server Error

is also not what I would have expected if you were banned, or maybe they used the code wrongly?
What code are you getting now? There are much better ones for throttle, or access ban. Wikipedia:

500 Internal Server Error
A generic error message, given when an unexpected condition was encountered and no more specific message is suitable.

429 Too Many Requests (RFC 6585)
The user has sent too many requests in a given amount of time. Intended for use with rate-limiting schemes.

10 HTTP status codes that sound like relationship problems has 403 Forbidden as a possible rate-limit.

To me, 500 Internal Server Error sounds wrong, but I don’t know what they do. What did they say?

Please say what Microsoft product you’re backing up to, e.g. name of plan, and Duplicati Storage Type.

I’m not sure which fits your use, but Microsoft has some product-specific guidance such as these pages:

Microsoft Graph throttling guidance (and you can see they say this will do a 429 Too Many Requests)
Avoid getting throttled or blocked in SharePoint Online (more likely to apply to business-level products)

Rate of upload might matter too. My line here is slow enough that I typically don’t worry much about use.
Google Drive, for example (and unlike Microsoft’s vagueness) documents a 750 GB per day upload limit.

4

I received the failed notification from Duplicati, I tried accessing OneDrive via a browser and they told me I was blocked and they made me verify my phone number. Then I had to wait 24 hours and the account was restored. I am getting code 500. Now they periodically disable the OAuth ID and I have to recreate. I am using Microsoft 365 Family and Onedrive v2.

5

Microsoft 365 and Office Customer Support says you have free tech support by phone or chat. Ask?
OneDrive v2 sounds like the right Duplicati choice. It uses the Microsoft Graph API. Old API is gone.

So this time your login is working, but Duplicati is getting an odd (or maybe their chosen?) response.
If you work with them, OAuth is the term to use. Don’t talk AuthID – that’s how Duplicati uses OAuth.

Have you found OneDrive space use (maybe in lower left of the files display) is below the 1 TB limit?

Are there any other apps with access? I see mine at bottom of Privacy screen at Apps and Services.
Others there include Cyberduck and rclone (for file access). If you have others, were they disabled?

This is all trying to pre-check how fully they blocked you in case it helps research or Support. Maybe Support knows all this stuff already and can tell you what’s going wrong, but you’d have to ask them.

From the Duplicati side, I suppose you could try a very small-and-gentle backup, maybe even using throttling using the throttle options at top of GUI, or using Advanced options such as throttle-upload.

On your Options screen 5, did you stick with the default 50 MB Remote volume size or change that?
In general, there’s a small chance that Advanced options may offend Microsoft. Any more suspects?

6

Its difficult to look into this without spending a lot of time but from what I understand, OneDrive doesn’t ban for limits being hit.

I believe there’s a piece of the puzzle here missing and seems like it was on the first failure before being blocked.

The error listed above 500 is not a big deal. Microsoft tells applications receiving that to do the following:

Resume or retry uploads that fail due to connection interruptions or any 5xx errors, including: 500 Internal Server Error on its API developer page (warning: programming terms).

Its also possible for documentation to be incorrect or outdated. Gets a bit complex in figuring it out to have a precise understanding.

Actually, blocked should be different from banned anyway. Blocked could happen from usage limit such as having to lower amount on their servers or buying a larger plan.

1 Like
7

From the advertised features, storage is 7 TB with one TB per family member, maybe they are blocking the prodigal child from hogging all the family’s storage ?

8

Please help me to unfreeze my OneDrive account might be relevant if a space issue is suspected.
This might be more relevant to past ban than current situation, but it’s probably a worthwhile read.

What does it mean when your OneDrive account is frozen? explains how using more than 1 TB is
possible by “sharing folders between users and adding the shared folders to your own OneDrive.”.

They also link you to https://onedrive.live.com/?v=managestorage to manage your storage usage.

Check your Recycle bin too. Awhile back, it seemed like mine counted towards threatening notes,
despite the fact that it didn’t count towards the calculated usage on folders screen. Inconsistent…

It’s possible that there is both a space issue behind the ban, and intermittent throttling happening.
M365 Throttling page at Veeam Backup for Microsoft 365 says it can cause either a 500 or a 429.