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Still locked out of my AWS account

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Re: Still locked out of my AWS account

#191

Post by ordinaryperson »

I spent a month and a half locked out of my AWS account due to 2FA issues and being caught in a Mobius strip with AWS support.

IMHO 2 problems with how AWS handles customer support (vs. other co's):

1. Different support rep every time = following the same script with every phone call. I'm sure assigning first available rep speeds up response times but for you, if the problem can't be resolved in 1 phone call it's like talking to someone with Alzheimer's, you're constantly re-answering the same 15 questions to a new person every time.

2. Customers are not allowed to directly interface with level 2+ support, only the nontechnical level 1 support can do that. Good luck getting them to communicate your technical issue correctly.

For example, every single support rep asked me if I had 2FA disabled for my Amazon retail account (I did). After re-answering this question with every single rep, they'd file tickets with the next level of support...only to be rejected later because level 2+ said it was most likely because I had 2FA on on my Amazon retail account (I did not). It was nearly impossible to bridge this disconnect.

Customer support is not easy to do well so I hesitate to widely impugn Amazon's efforts, but if you're an AWS customer and you have an issue that's an edge case outside of the scripts these support reps are using prepare to waste weeks or months of your life trying to resolve it.

Re: Still locked out of my AWS account

#192

Post by kinkrtyavimoodh »

stickydink wrote: post #141

I've been locked out of my AWS account for almost 3 years now. I have 2FA enabled, tied to a phone number I no longer have access to. I receive two emails per month. One invoice, for $0.80 (I cannot remember what is running on there, but I guess it must be something). One threatening, "Your AWS Account is about to be suspended". I've been "about to be suspended" for the entire 3 years. I want to pay the bill, I can't…

I sympathize with your predicament, but I can say I am very happy to know that Amazon won't just let anybody get access to a 2FA account without a substantial burden of proof.

We all read horror stories of people's accounts being compromised via trivial social engineering hacks. This will always be a balancing act. And to be honest I am all for erring on the side of caution.

Re: Still locked out of my AWS account

#193

Post by foobarbazetc »

ccleve wrote: post #148
stickydink wrote: post #141

I've been locked out of my AWS account for almost 3 years now. I have 2FA enabled, tied to a phone number I no longer have access to. I receive two emails per month. One invoice, for $0.80 (I cannot remember what is running on there, but I guess it must be something). One threatening, "Your AWS Account is about to be suspended". I've been "about to be suspended" for the entire 3 years. I want to pay the bill, I can't…

You can get something notarized, at least in Illinois, for $1. Just go to a currency exchange. Most banks will do it for free.

The term "notarization" means very different things depending on the country you live in.

Outside the US this process can be lengthy and/or expensive as it can even result in official government stamps, translations, etc.

Re: Still locked out of my AWS account

#194

Post by Thaxll »

Twirrim wrote: post #77
colinmeinke wrote: post #2

8 days ago I tried to log in to my Amazon retail account, and received a password invalid error. As it turned out my account had been closed, as it appeared to Amazon that it had received a suspicious log in. This is the same account that I use for AWS - hosting websites critical to my business. Today it appears I am no closer to gaining access back to my AWS account than I was on day 1, even though I have been bille…

In all seriousness, email jeff@amazon.com. The most likely outcome is that some relevant managers will receive one of the infamous "?" emails from him. If so, that'll result in two things: 1) Your problem will be resolved ASAP, managers right up the chain will be tracking it extremely closely, as they'll have to justify every action to Jeff. Everyone goes scrambling when one of those emails goes out. 2) A post-mortem…

Because you think sending an email to Jeff will actually get into his inbox or even read by himself? lol.

Re: Still locked out of my AWS account

#195

Post by cookiecaper »

mirekrusin wrote: post #70

Also having problem with AWS - can't access it and they keep billing me for something there I want to shut it down (EC2?) but I can't. I recently moved from Brazil to UK (new address) and changed phone + sim card (Authenticator after restore from backup lost all 2 factor auth entries). This is the moment when you realise that you're outside of predefined use cases of The Machine and you're fucked. Nobody is here to h…

Google Authenticator is a bad 2FA app. Authenticator+ costs a couple of bucks but has many features that make it much easier to use, including the ability to back up an encrypted copy of your 2FA keys (standard disclaimers about risk of compromise to this file, yadda yadda yadda). When you change phones, you just download that, decrypt, and pick up where you left off; no hassle trying to replace the 2FA generators, which is a PITA when you have one 2FA, let alone going through that process for several accounts.

If you're going to use Google Authenticator anyway, at least unlock your bootloader before you initialize the identities. You can't get to the key database without being rooted, even if you're doing a full backup with adb, and unlocking/relocking the bootloader wipes the device.

Re: Still locked out of my AWS account

#196

Post by vivekd »

stickydink wrote: post #141

I've been locked out of my AWS account for almost 3 years now. I have 2FA enabled, tied to a phone number I no longer have access to. I receive two emails per month. One invoice, for $0.80 (I cannot remember what is running on there, but I guess it must be something). One threatening, "Your AWS Account is about to be suspended". I've been "about to be suspended" for the entire 3 years. I want to pay the bill, I can't…

I don't understand, why don't you just notarize the form and send it back to them, notaries are really cheap.

Re: Still locked out of my AWS account

#197

Post by raesene9 »

djsumdog wrote: post #188
raesene6 wrote: post #143

Whilst this is more about AWS accounts, the ability of Amazon (and other cloud providers) to lock you out of an account with very limited recourse does present some other problems. I've got quite a few ebooks I've bought via Amazon Kindle. If amazon one day decided to delete/lock my account, I would lose access to all that content which I had "bought". The more data people store in various cloud providers systems, th…

You don't really buy eBooks. You can't resell them after all. You're just renting them. I'd look up some of the free tools out there and backup/un-DRM your Amazon/Nook/Google e-books. There are some guides out there for extracting your books notes as well.

Thus my quotes around "bought" . Again whilst technical people likely know the consequences of buying DRM protected content, I think that a non-technical person who suddenly found their paid for content removed from them due to an automated process locking/deleting their account would be quite upset.

People are, for better or worse, entrusting more and more of their content to cloud services, things like photographs, documents they've created, music etc etc.

Re: Still locked out of my AWS account

#198

Post by foobarbazetc »

mirekrusin wrote: post #70

Also having problem with AWS - can't access it and they keep billing me for something there I want to shut it down (EC2?) but I can't. I recently moved from Brazil to UK (new address) and changed phone + sim card (Authenticator after restore from backup lost all 2 factor auth entries). This is the moment when you realise that you're outside of predefined use cases of The Machine and you're fucked. Nobody is here to h…

I store my 2FA in 4 different authenticator apps on my phone just in case.

Google Authenticator has never restored these properly, ever. Encrypted backups or not.

Re: Still locked out of my AWS account

#199

Post by CobrastanJorji »

andrewvc wrote: post #149
stickydink wrote: post #141

I've been locked out of my AWS account for almost 3 years now. I have 2FA enabled, tied to a phone number I no longer have access to. I receive two emails per month. One invoice, for $0.80 (I cannot remember what is running on there, but I guess it must be something). One threatening, "Your AWS Account is about to be suspended". I've been "about to be suspended" for the entire 3 years. I want to pay the bill, I can't…

The UPS store will notarize stuff for like $10-20 bucks FYI.

Unless you live in Kansas, Iowa, Maine, Alaska, or Louisiana, you won't be charged over $10.
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