1: Don't depend on Google, Amazon, Facebook, Twitter etc. not to suddenly lock you out of your account for no apparent reason.
2: Don't expect to be able to get through to anyone at Google, Amazon, Facebook, Twitter etc. who cares about your problem, if it does happen.
3: If you do insist on using a service like Gmail, don't keep all your eggs in the webmail basket. Access your account via an email client with IMAP. Then, if you get locked out, you'll at least still have your email archives and can move on from there.
It never ceases to amaze me the people who trust monolithic unaccountable 3rd parties with their "important" data and then compound the issue by not having a local copy to fall back on.
It took 6 months and a formal GDPR complaint to the Irish Data Protection Commissioner before Twitter finally unlocked the accounts and admitted they'd made a mistake[1]:
>Hello,
>We’re writing to let you know that we’ve unsuspended your
>accounts. We’re sorry for the inconvenience and hope to see you
>back on Twitter soon.
>A little background: we have systems that find and remove
>multiple automated spam accounts in bulk, and yours was flagged
>as spam by mistake. Please note that it may take an hour or so
>for your follower and following numbers to return to normal
Thankfully in my case, it was just some shitty Twitter accounts and I'm actually quite glad it happened now as it gave me the impetus excise another pointless moronic social network from my online life.
Well, recently I went back on it (after a few years of not using it, although I use my regular Amazon and AWS account all the time). And it said I'm not allowed to take on work, because my payment method has been suspended for a policy violation. Which policy? How do I get it un-suspended? Did someone else compromise it to use it illicitly? Nothing on the page gives me any clue of how/who/what to contact.
I'm not comfortable at all with the thought of Google harvesting data about everything I search for, buy, or sell on eBay. But, frankly, being able to avoid the killing rage that descends on me every time I see one of those fucking reCaptchas is worth the loss in privacy!
If Google banned my account, my phone would probably be useless, but other than that I wouldn't have any negative consequences. If Facebook banned my account, I wouldn't care at all (I spend less than 5 min per month on there). If Amazon banned my account, same thing (stripped DRM from all ebooks I've purchased there). Microsoft, same (losing my GitHub account would be a bummer, but wouldn't impact my work which is on GitLab). And as far as Apple goes, the only product of theirs I've ever owned was a USB Type C cable.
Of course, getting to that point wasn't easy and required years of conscious effort to make my data independent: https://input.sh/healthy-relationship-with-google/
If you really want to stick with Gmail, Google Apps is cheap for one user, but goto alternatives are Fastmail and Protonmail.
I want to collect your ideas how we can fix this problem/issue once and for all
Ban me from your services if you want, but banned accounts should be able to download their information, for a reasonable timeframe.
In the case you were using Google products as a business (YouTube, Google apps), allow the banned user to show a text communicating to their users the service they moved to or where they can be contacted.
It's a bare minimum, but it would get us real far.
This needs to be law.
It’s really frustrating.
Sony also scares me sometimes, i get email that I broke their terms in some chat message in some game (my son uses my account) but no fucking detail on what exactly is the problem(I would not be surprised if they are so incompetent to get triggered by non english words , so children report each other to troll)
Or maybe make a post on HN, and leave it to the mods to take it to the first page so someone at Google can notice and 'contact someone internally'
So, IOWs, you're wasting everyone's time with this. Just saying.
Look at all the bad publicity they get from [with no insult intended] much more influential sources than yourself. They carry on regardless and I don't see them haemorrhaging customers, because of it.
The question arises if the government should intervene and finally make the internet and the online profile it comes with it a basic fundamental right?
E.g. when you go and pick up your personal I.D. you should also get your personal email and credentials, so no corporation can make you disappear online..
Of course, the UX sucks and nobody sane would use it for anything useful, but it is a backup email address you'd be unlikely to be kicked off of.
I've been unsuccessfully trying to get my account back for 7 years after a "joke" went wrong and someone replaced my profile picture with that of a decaying penis.
I realize Facebook can't just "start doing that" at their scale, and that my best luck would be to reach out to someone high-up enough in their organization.
So I've been starting to send monthly postcards from France both to Zuck's house and to random executives @Fb Headquarters with a very compelling story explaining how happy I would be if I ever got my memories back, and not just their stupid account backup file.
I know you wrote this between '' but how does that even happen... For one I know 0 people who would find that funny (it's more embarrassing, including for the prankster) but the move confusing thing; how did they gain access to your account? Unless the entire account was a joke?
Setting up mail forwarding to another address you own might also help (assuming Google doesn't stop the forwarding when they lock you out which is something I heard but it's not confirmed).
Use your own domain you can quickly update to a new mail server. (Make sure you never lose access to the domain or let registration lapse)
Every single time someone posts about those the majority of replies here, are "They are a private company so they can do whatever they want!"
There is no difference here. Like or comment on a "wrong" Youtube video? Say goodbye to your Google account.
Google is locking me out of my 11 years old Google account (Gmail, Adsense, YouTube, Analytics, ...) I use for a side project (electronic music blog) because I'm trying to log in from a new device/country/IP.
Alright then, I'll try to recover the account with the security question or the recovery email.
Nope, Google doesn't even let me enter the recovery process because of the same error. I can't do anything because of a stupid flag on the account.
The best part? Everytime I'm trying to log into my account, I get a security alert email sent to my recovery email. I can say to Google that I don't recognize the connexion (AccountDisavow) but I have NO OPTION to allow it. What's the point of having a recovery email?
Can't Google see that it's the same IP trying to log in and trying to access the "Review activity" from the security alert email?
If any Google employee is reading this, I'd love some help!
It's given me some background anxiety about relying on Google for my email, Amazon for my hosting, and so on.
I've recently been locked out of a couple of accounts I hadn't used in more than a year. I didn't forget the password or anything, Google just prevents access to the accounts with no recourse.
In some cases, this article gives the right to appeal an algorithmic decision and require a human review.
https://ec.europa.eu/info/law/law-topic/data-protection/refo...
https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/guide-to-data-protectio...