In reference to this issue if you use the uploader plugin and set in the model's relation 'public' => false the file will be uploaded to the public folder instead of protected because it is harded coded to true in ComponentUtils - A fix is to uncomment this line
https://github.com/responsiv/uploader-plugin/blob/2e7b254b3c8c03f5bce85358d970a14b8d14055e/traits/ComponentUtils.php#L150
In reference to this issue if you use the uploader plugin and set in the model's relation
'public' => false
the file will be uploaded to the public folder instead of protected because it is harded coded to true in ComponentUtils - A fix is to uncomment this line