Earlier quoted context omitted.
You're willing to pay the $30, $40, $50 AWS bill for services you aren't using but the $5 notary charge is some grave affront?
As said already in other comments of sibling thread: notary fees can differ hugely depending on state/country and may be more on the order of $40-$50.
Still locked out of my AWS account
251–260 of 283 posts
Re: Still locked out of my AWS account
#252Earlier quoted context omitted.
So what is your plan in case your phone gets lost/stolen/whatever and you lose access to your TOTP app?
Use the backup codes they provided you with when you set up 2FA. Or does Amazon not have those? (If not that seems really strange, every other service I've set up 2FA on has that recovery method.)
Re: Still locked out of my AWS account
#253Also 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
#254Earlier quoted context omitted.
This happened to me with instagram. I reset a password, then they detected "suspicious activity." I clicked "send pin via email" and the email never shows up. I've done it 3 or 4 times over the course of a week + it never works. It's a documented error + FB/Instagram refuse to addres it. https://medium.com/@joelrunyon/instagrams-security-features-...
Took me weeks to get back an Instagram account that was locked as soon as I signed up, with a phone number too. Half the forms that are meant to help you are actually broken and 500 error most of the time. After many emails I ended up having to send a photo of myself holding a sign with the username and some random code on it. So bizarre. It's not like Facebook don't know my entire life history, but hoops still had t…
Re: Still locked out of my AWS account
#255Earlier quoted context omitted.
Cancel your card. Problem solved.
To clarify, get a new number for your credit card account; don't cancel it entirely. If it's your oldest credit card account then canceling it outright will have bad repercussions for your credit score.
Re: Still locked out of my AWS account
#256Earlier quoted context omitted.
It seems like Google uses some heuristics when deciding whether to ban an account. My theory is that if you stick with your personal gmail account, you have such a long history of activity that it's unlikely to be flagged by whatever "smart" algorithm they're using. I was quite surprised that my gmail account was banned without doing anything remotely malicious. (Certainly not anything listed in https://www.google.co…
> It seems like Google uses some heuristics when deciding whether to ban an account. My theory is that if you stick with your personal gmail account, you have such a long history of activity that it's unlikely to be flagged by whatever "smart" algorithm they're using. I never saw/heard of evidence of such behavior. > but you'll still lose your emails if they decide to suspend you Emails are easily backupable, you can…
I'm personally considering hushmail (Canadian) or some other paid email in the future, for maximum piece of mind, any double digit number seems reasonable enough annually. Some out of the way liberal first world country , no superpower (and superspy) aspirations, a small paid provider (that actually needs customers and word of mouth and not throwing their weight around, Google is notorious for deleting YT channels willy nilly for 'guidelines violation' and then restoring them after a shit storm) to ensure no 'smart' 'ML' algorithm bans you. Sounds just about right.
Re: Still locked out of my AWS account
#257First was an old pre-Atlassian BitBucket one that just broke due to shenanigans with Atliassian accounts integration or SOMETHING. But big props to them. I complain and I get it fixed super quick. Just how it should be. Solid 4 out of 5 (5 is for guys who managed to not lock my account due to weird mergers, I'm even OK with the weird "don't use FRex, form now on login with your email: smtsmt@gmail.com" I get on attempting 'FRex' + password).
Second is Twitter. FUCK THEM so hard. Excuse my French but I have no other words for how idiotic this situation is, it'd make a saint mad.
I make an Twitter account using my secondary/side gmail account that has been phone verified and 2FA using Google Auth for Andoird, verified my Twitter account by clicking link in the email they sent there, connect it to my YouTube account that has been phone verified, send out the welcoming tweet they propose (something like "Hello Twitter!", I think it was just a button press or a combo box to pick from but I might be wrong now) and I get banned for (exact wording may vary) 'suspicious/possibly automated activity' (mhmm... these huge botnets of phone verified 2FA gmail and YT accounts operating out of EU ips... good job catching me Twitter).
I could of course act like a good peon and provide them a phone number and be graciously allowed by the Twitter Heavenly Emperors to use my 10 minutes old account. I write to their support via some super idiotically hidden panel of theirs on twitter while still in my 'locked' account and.. I get an automated (!) email to my gmail (!!) telling me in steps how to just fuck off and enter my phone number (!!!) and to ask for help if I don't have it unlocked after providing a phone number and waiting a few minutes ('fucktastic' was the word of the day that day, seriously, that made my day). I wrote another one, telling them to shove it (in kinder words and with zero profanity but firmly making it clear I'd not provide my number on account I did literally nothing on and want to use for YouTube connectivity to a verified channel and created on a 2FA and phone verified gmail account I verified by clicking the link in the email) and got another bot email and no reply since then (about a month ago). Total human replies: 0. Bot replies: 3+ (see below). And I'm the one running an automated operation in here.
And the cherry on top: I still get trending political BS tweets (because that's what trending where I live every week) sent to my social tab in gmail and can't disable it since my account is locked and throws me to 'provide a number' screen that only has 'help' (blabbering about how I must be the one in the wrong here but if I provide a phone number..) and 'log out' available. Good fucking riddance. I truly dodged a bullet by using my alternate gmail!
And all this on a service that has users that are outright bots, Nazis, terrorists (ISIS itself), hacktivists (you can argue some of it is a positive force for change or securing up but it's still highly illegal and often done just for lulz) and the like.
Of course I'm not going to give in to this BS. I can sort of understand Google/YouTube with their stuff and it actually helped me once by requiring SMS verification when my kinda weak old password got cracked/guessed but what Twitter did is downright dumb extortion ("gib phon number! gib, gib, don't write support requests! 1st gib!") or them being idiots (what did I do that's suspicious exactly.. make a Twitter account in 2017?) and grossly neglecting their users (0 human reply, ever). Twitter fortunately would just be a nice-to-have for my side hobby of YTing and I have the privilege of saying "fuck no" to them for this and shitting on them on every occasion but if this was my mail gmail it'd do me in for weeks before I recovered all of my stuff.
There are horror stories on YT too, see Millbee (let's plays) or I Hate Everything a.k.a. IHE(critique/shitposting), banned overnight (Millbee for a nip snip in an anime game despite all the nudity, GONE SEXUAL and borderline CP on YT going unpunished and IHE for 'community guidelines' for a video of smashing a film DVD that was later hand judged as not in violation), both returned after a social shitstorm but with no apology, explanation, nothing. I bet if I was a high up in some company and had a company account tweet what BS I went through it'd all suddenly be fixed in a jiffy with no need for my phone number. But what are internet and real life rank and file tech nobodies supposed to do..?
Re: Still locked out of my AWS account
#258Earlier quoted context omitted.
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.
I feel sorry for those foreign countries where notaries are either rarified or unobtainably expensive, but it doesn't apply to this thread.
That said, I think Amazon's policy of notarization (at least in the US sense and fees) seems a reasonable policy from an account security standpoint. Not sure I can sympathize with GP who voluntarily added 2FA to their own Amazon account, then no longer had access to the phone number they previously used. $20 is not unreasonable for something that GP could have prevented with some forethought.
Re: Still locked out of my AWS account
#259I'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 had to cancel that credit card in the end as I couldn't get access to the account and their support is, as far as I can tell, automated email responses. I also had the threat to suspend my account over many days (to which I was responding, 'Yes, please do'), but they stubbornly just kept threatening instead of closing the account. The support person did not seem to respond to what I wrote in my replies at all, just pasted a stock response that didn't make sense in context.
They really cannot seem to handle their scale in terms of their customer support (and I wonder how many people are getting bitten for small chunks of cash).
Re: Still locked out of my AWS account
#260Earlier quoted context omitted.
This anecdote makes me very happy with AWS. I want loss of 2FA to completely revoke access to my account. Otherwise any smart hacker can social engineer Amazon support with some fake drivers license photo and steal all my BTC (for example).
So what is your plan in case your phone gets lost/stolen/whatever and you lose access to your TOTP app?