Stop sharing in Proton Drive: what links and invitees lose

Use Stop sharing when you want to end sharing for an item: it deletes the public link and removes access for everyone invited by email. To remove just one invitee, use Remove access beside that person’s name. The two controls have different scopes, so a link can remain usable after an invitee is removed, and an invitee can retain access after a public link expires.

Neither action deletes the owner’s file. If the owner can still open it in My files, that is the expected result, not evidence that sharing is still on.

Choose the scope in Manage share

Open Manage share for the item and check how it is shared.

1. To remove one Viewer or Editor, open the arrow beside that recipient and choose Remove access. Proton says a removed email recipient immediately loses access to the shared item.
2. To end both the public link and every email invitation for the item, open the Settings gear and choose Stop sharing.
3. If a public link has an expiry, reaching that expiry ends the link route. It does not, by itself, remove people invited by email.

An accepted email invitation can put the item in a recipient’s Shared with me area. A public link is a separate route. Someone with the link may have Viewer access, which includes downloading. Before choosing a control, decide whether the problem is one person’s invitation, the public link, or every sharing route for this item.

Changing a person from Editor to Viewer addresses editing. It does not end their ability to view the item. Likewise, removing an Editor’s invitation does not close a public Viewer link they can use.

A school-group example

Suppose the owner shares proof.pdf in two ways. Rowan and Jules have both accepted email invitations. Rowan is an Editor, Jules is a Viewer, and a public Viewer link has also been posted to a school group. Rowan downloaded the file yesterday. These are assumptions for an example, not observations from an account.

The owner now wants Rowan to stop editing while Jules keeps access. Removing Rowan through the arrow beside Rowan’s name addresses the email invitation without removing Jules. The public link still matters: because it grants Viewer access, Rowan could still use it to view or download the item if Rowan has the URL. Rowan would no longer have the editing access granted by the removed invitation.

If the owner instead wants to end every sharing route to this proof.pdf, Stop sharing is the control with that scope. It deletes the public link and removes both Rowan and Jules as invitees. Jules would lose the intended access too, so this is the wrong choice when keeping Jules’s invitation is part of the goal. The owner’s own file remains in My files.

Now change only one event: the public link reaches its expiry. The link route ends, while Rowan’s and Jules’s email invitations remain. A report that “the link stopped working, but Jules still sees the file” is therefore consistent with an expired link and an active invitation. It is not enough to conclude that Stop sharing was used.

Rowan’s download is a different kind of access. The sharing controls govern the shared item; they do not retrieve a copy already saved in Rowan’s Downloads folder. Ending both cloud sharing routes would leave that assumed local copy in place. If the owner uploaded a separate duplicate of proof.pdf and shared it under another URL, controls applied to the selected item do not establish the sharing state of that separate upload.

Compare the before-and-after states

Use the sharing-scope exercise to follow the example. It starts with a public link, accepted invitations for two recipients, and a downloaded copy. It contains no real account fields and performs no revocation.

Select Remove only Recipient A’s invitation. A’s invitation becomes unavailable, but B’s invitation and the public link remain. A could still open through the public route if A has the link and any required password. The example’s public-link status alone does not establish that A has those credentials.

Next select Public link reaches its expiration date. This is a fresh calculation from the checked starting state, not a second operation on the previous result. Both accepted invitations remain while the public link ends. Finally, select Stop sharing for everyone. The public link and both invitations end together. A’s already downloaded copy stays, as does the owner’s file.

You can clear the downloaded-copy switch when no copy is assumed, or clear an invitation that never existed. Those changes explain why two apparently identical sharing incidents can have different consequences: the item had different access routes before the action. The exercise omits parent-folder sharing and independent duplicate uploads. For a real item, inspect those entry points separately instead of treating the model as an account audit.

Diagnose what still opens

Start by identifying exactly what the person opened. “I can still see the file” could refer to an old public URL, an item in Shared with me, the owner’s item in My files, or a downloaded copy. Those observations point to different places. Shared with me can also contain a public folder saved for later, so inspect the invitation list and the copied URL as well as the tab name.

If Rowan’s email invitation was removed but the old public URL still opens, check the public-link route. Removing one recipient is not the same as ending the link. If the old URL no longer works but Jules can open the accepted item in Shared with me, check Jules’s invitation. A failed link alone does not show that invitees were removed.

If someone opens proof.pdf from Downloads while offline, that says the local copy is available. It does not show whether a Proton Drive link or invitation still works. Similarly, the owner opening the item from My files does not test recipient access.

For a private check, use the route the recipient actually reported: the old URL for a link claim, or the accepted shared item for an invitation claim. Check a local Downloads path separately. You do not need to send passwords or file contents to support to describe which route still opens. If two people report different results, note which route and which item each used before changing more permissions.

The Access toggle is a different control

Proton is rolling out the ability for Editors to manage access in the web app. Where available, the owner can use Settings and turn off Access to prevent Editors from changing permissions or sharing the item with others. An Editor cannot change or remove the owner’s access.

The word Access on that switch can be misleading beside Remove access. Turning off the switch limits an Editor’s ability to manage sharing. Removing the person’s invitation ends the access granted by that invitation. Stop sharing ends the public link and all email invitations for the selected item. Match the control to the part of the arrangement you want to change.

For the school-group example, keeping Rowan as an Editor while switching off access management would still let Rowan edit. That would not achieve the stated goal of ending Rowan’s editing. Keeping a public Viewer route, on the other hand, can permit reading after Rowan’s Editor invitation is removed. Both results follow from the scope of the control, not from a failed save.

Source note: Based on Proton’s access-management, shareable-link, and email-sharing instructions, checked October 7, 2026. The Rowan and Jules example is synthetic and assumes sharing on the item itself; it does not model parent-folder access, cached copies, or other account controls. No real account test was performed.