
Ask HN: Locked out of Google services with no recourse or explanation - nikkwong
It&#x27;s probably the fifth time this week that I&#x27;ve gotten the message in gmail:<p>&quot;Unusual Usage - Account Temporarily Locked Down&quot;<p>&quot;To keep our systems healthy, Google has temporarily disabled your account. This primarily occurs when we detect unusually high levels of activity on your account. In most cases, it should take one hour to regain access. In rare cases, it can take up to 24 hours for access to be reinstated.&quot;<p>This is not just annoying, it&#x27;s disruptive and catastrophic for someone like me, who, runs my business through email. Which, unsuspiciously, involves sending maybe a dozen or so emails a day through gmail. And nothing more. It&#x27;s been a few hours now, and there&#x27;s never any knowing when I&#x27;ll get my account back.<p>How is this acceptable? I can&#x27;t possibly move away from gmail, all my consulting gigs use google for work, i&#x27;ve disseminated my gmail address too far across the web.. But, this happens  over and over, and I&#x27;ve begun to feel really helpless.<p>Are there any people at Google that can be contacted about something like this? Or this machine is really running itself and there&#x27;s nothing that can be done?
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jocoda
Looks like you may get help to resolve your issues, hope so.

> How is this acceptable?

Have to rather ask why is it not acceptable? Google can and does do what it
likes or thinks it has to.

You're a sheep in one of googles pastures - a nice, cozy place in the wild
world of the internet. They have made it comfy and easy to use because most
sheep have no clue how to use the internet otherwise. There's relative safety
in the numbers, but sheep get sheared regularly, and some get eaten, either by
the shepherd or the predators that manage to sneak in.

>I can't possibly move away from gmail,...

That's patently false. Lots of options mentioned here and elsewhere. Rather
admit you don't want to. Nothing wrong with that.

~~~
ajeet_dhaliwal
It’s definitley not acceptable if he’s using G Suite, he/she said ‘google for
work’ and it’s not clear whether they are a paying user or not.

~~~
jocoda
If he is a paying user then he already has a 24/7 support structure in place.
Given the post made, I think it's a reasonable to assume that he's not.

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prlambert
Sorry to hear that, I might be able to help. I work on Gmail. DM me the
details on twitter @prlambert (or if you gain email access prl@google.com).

~~~
stephenSinniah
Hi, Sorry for troubling you but I've been locked out of my gmail account for
nearly a year. I was using a password manager to store the password and the
password database was stored locally,the database then got corrupted (I know
I'm an idiot for not backing it up). I've tried to go through the account
recovery process as I still posses the same phone number linked to that gmail
account, however I'm unable to answer the question about when my account was
created exactly, It was such a long time ago and I can't seem to remember it
and at the end I get the error message "Google couldn't verify this account
belongs to you". Is there any way to recover my account? I would really
appreciate help in anyway possible, if that's alright with you. Thanks.

~~~
girishso
My friend doesn’t have the phone number linked with gmail account anymore,
because it was set almost 13 years back. Anyway he can recover his account? He
has already tried all the options available.

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danieltillett
I would say you can't possibly continue to use google services. Move now no
matter how painful as it will only get worse.

~~~
dickbasedregex
Fastmail is good. Docs is still hard to beat.

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ap46
This is another timely reminder for everybody to get a simple domain(e.g.
Namecheap, now with free whois-privacy as well) & maybe use Zoho mail to
manage it for free(IIRC upto 2 in the free-tier). Then forward it to your
gmail or whatever. That way you never lose the email address even if something
untowardly happens to the forwarded email. I've learnt this the hard way.

~~~
iforgotpassword
Wait, what's the point of doing this? If you forward to gmail and then your
gmail account suddenly gets a lockdown, what did you gain? Shouldn't you do it
the other way round, forward all gmail to your own mail server and then only
use that one?

~~~
lccarrasco
If you forward to Gmail then you can still receive mails to the other service
should Google disable your account, if you do it the other way you're screwed.

~~~
iforgotpassword
I see.. I was thinking along the lines of migrating away from google and
having the forwarding in place for contacts that didn't update your address
yet. Or that couple of services you use but forget about. So you can slowly
move everything to the new address over time.

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qplex
I think it's not acceptable, but there is really no way around it.

Google provides free services to over a billion people and it it would
probably cost them too much to provide real support.

It's just too bad you can't have a "Pro" account with Google that you could
pay for and have more reasonable terms of service etc.

~~~
some_account
Coat them too much? They are one of the richest companies in the world.

Google doesn't care about its users except for the purpose of using you as
their product in exchange for giving you a free, shitty email service.

And still there are people who don't even look at Fastmail (which is awesome,
run by true techies who cares about privacy, AND has a much better user
interface than Gmail).

~~~
qplex
Yes, I'm pretty sure the cost of doing it is why they decide not to do it.
Business logic and all that, more profit for Google.

Edit: And you are right, it's not really free service since you opt for your
data to be mined by Google for whatever purposes. If you need privacy you'll
probably want to use something else.

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all_hawk
I've had similar issues with other google services. It seems that no matter
the persistency with which you pursue a result from google they will take
their time and eventually do what they want.

In fact, in my experience I was setting up a new google service while on the
phone with a google technician and got locked out while on the phone during
initial set up...it took nearly 5 days to get unlocked.

I still use google, but mainly to the point of @jocoda - I don't want to deal
with the hassle of using something different. It's simple, fast, and easy ...
unless something goes wrong.

EDIT: I recommend following others advice and get out while you can if you
can't live with the issues you are having because in all likelihood it will
get worse, not better.

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windhover
Once you're back in the gmail account, just add a forwarding to another
account.

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mabynogy
> How is this acceptable?

It is not.

If I had that problem I'd go for protonmail an explain my story to everybody
who wanna here it.

