When running drive.mount('/content/drive') in any Google Colab notebook (both new blank notebooks and third-party notebooks), the OAuth authorization flow behaves incorrectly:
The authorization popup opens, but identifies itself as "Google Drive for desktop" instead of "Google Colaboratory" (which is the expected behavior and what happens on other accounts).
After clicking "Continue" and authorizing, the window closes and Colab returns the error: MessageError: Error: credential propagation was unsuccessful.
"Google Drive for desktop" reappears in the connected apps list at myaccount.google.com/permissions after each attempt, even after I manually remove it beforehand — meaning Colab is requesting authorization under the wrong client ID.
At https://myaccount.google.com/permissions, the "Google Colaboratory" app does not appear in the list of apps with access, despite multiple authorization attempts.
Troubleshooting steps already performed without success:
Removed "Google Drive for desktop" from myaccount.google.com/permissions (it automatically comes back after each Colab authorization attempt)
Cleared Chrome cookies and cache
Tested in Chrome Incognito mode
Tested in a different browser
Disconnected and deleted the Colab runtime multiple times
Used auth.authenticate_user() and drive.mount(force_remount=True)
Tested with a new blank notebook (not just third-party notebooks)
Technical note:
I do not have the "Google Drive for desktop" application installed on my computer. The link to this OAuth client appears to exist exclusively on the server side and is being incorrectly invoked by Colab's authentication flow for this specific account.
Impact:
Complete inability to use Google Drive as persistent storage in Colab, which makes it impossible to use the platform with the 2 TB Google One plan I'm paying for.
Browser: Google Chrome (latest version)
Operating system: Windows
When running drive.mount('/content/drive') in any Google Colab notebook (both new blank notebooks and third-party notebooks), the OAuth authorization flow behaves incorrectly:
The authorization popup opens, but identifies itself as "Google Drive for desktop" instead of "Google Colaboratory" (which is the expected behavior and what happens on other accounts).
After clicking "Continue" and authorizing, the window closes and Colab returns the error: MessageError: Error: credential propagation was unsuccessful.
"Google Drive for desktop" reappears in the connected apps list at myaccount.google.com/permissions after each attempt, even after I manually remove it beforehand — meaning Colab is requesting authorization under the wrong client ID.
At https://myaccount.google.com/permissions, the "Google Colaboratory" app does not appear in the list of apps with access, despite multiple authorization attempts.
Troubleshooting steps already performed without success:
Removed "Google Drive for desktop" from myaccount.google.com/permissions (it automatically comes back after each Colab authorization attempt)
Cleared Chrome cookies and cache
Tested in Chrome Incognito mode
Tested in a different browser
Disconnected and deleted the Colab runtime multiple times
Used auth.authenticate_user() and drive.mount(force_remount=True)
Tested with a new blank notebook (not just third-party notebooks)
Technical note:
I do not have the "Google Drive for desktop" application installed on my computer. The link to this OAuth client appears to exist exclusively on the server side and is being incorrectly invoked by Colab's authentication flow for this specific account.
Impact:
Complete inability to use Google Drive as persistent storage in Colab, which makes it impossible to use the platform with the 2 TB Google One plan I'm paying for.
Browser: Google Chrome (latest version)
Operating system: Windows