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Google users locked out after 15 years' use

businessinsider.com

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Re: Google users locked out after 15 years' use

#151

Post by mbeex »

Many commentators mention e-mail here: I'm a conservative oldtimer with my own domain (since the Ninetees) and associated e-mail, of course.

The problem is that it happens to me more and more often that especially with my business contacts in larger companies my e-mail is filtered out / ends up in their junk folders / disappears for other, unspecified reasons. Simple public black lists do not show anything. I am more the developer and not the infrastructure type, but the company policies seem to contain more and more features of downgrading private domains. And in my opinion this is supported by some kind of dirty game of global IT players at technical and other levels.

Re: Google users locked out after 15 years' use

#153

Post by GekkePrutser »

grandpoobah wrote: post #147

This article finally prompted me to do what I should've done a long time ago, which is to create a Fastmail account and begin importing my Gmail into it. I've seen this story far too many times, and no longer will I say "yeah but it'll never happen to me". Setting up the import was insanely easy, and my Fastmail account is now configured to enable me to send using my Gmail address from directly within Fastmail. Plus…

But even then you have to trust FastMail not to lock you out. Sure it's a paid service so less likely and I'm sure their customer service is better. But it doesn't fix the root issue of being dependent on one party.

Re: Google users locked out after 15 years' use

#154

Post by TheBobinator »

Cloud is giving a service provider all of the benefits of a utility with none of the responsabilities. If Compute was really a utility, then like water, sewer, and internet, it'd be highly regulated.

BTW, Mailstore free can backup your google e-mails handidly and is the best such client for doing so.

Re: Google users locked out after 15 years' use

#155

Post by blunte »

mbeex wrote: post #151

Many commentators mention e-mail here: I'm a conservative oldtimer with my own domain (since the Ninetees) and associated e-mail, of course. The problem is that it happens to me more and more often that especially with my business contacts in larger companies my e-mail is filtered out / ends up in their junk folders / disappears for other, unspecified reasons. Simple public black lists do not show anything. I am more…

The bias against major player-hosted email was probably rooted in spam prevention, but there's little doubt in my mind that they (the few big players) recognize the value of attempting to force users to use their service, and then to trap them.

Re: Google users locked out after 15 years' use

#156

Post by TheChaplain »

mbeex wrote: post #151

Many commentators mention e-mail here: I'm a conservative oldtimer with my own domain (since the Ninetees) and associated e-mail, of course. The problem is that it happens to me more and more often that especially with my business contacts in larger companies my e-mail is filtered out / ends up in their junk folders / disappears for other, unspecified reasons. Simple public black lists do not show anything. I am more…

That is a hassle indeed, you need to set up SPF, DMARC and DKIM to at least have a chance to reach the inbox on gmail or outlook.

Re: Google users locked out after 15 years' use

#157

Post by GekkePrutser »

Yeah I'm always worried about this.

I have a paid Microsoft office 365 account with all my email and a lot of data on it. I backup my OneDrive regularly using an rsync-style tool. But the email is more difficult now that it's all in exchange format. I could use IMAP die the backup but Microsoft is going to block basic authentication soon.

Re: Google users locked out after 15 years' use

#158

Post by blunte »

kioleanu wrote: post #142
mjochim wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you upload all the messages from your client to fastmail or were they copied directly from Google to fastmail?

You just connect your Google account in the Fastmail settings and they set everything automatically

I wonder how long this will last until Google finds a way to prevent the migration out...

Re: Google users locked out after 15 years' use

#159

Post by Laurentvw »

TheChaplain wrote: post #3

Tip: Get your own domain from a non-google registrar, then connect to Gmail if you prefer. If you ever are locked out, you can just move the address to another email-provider. Another trick is to use always have forwarding enabled in Gmail, to Outlook.com or another provider. All email will be forwarded despite your account being locked, so you will not miss out on important info. And use Google Takeout for backing u…

Just wondering if there are any trade-offs to consider if I were to use Google Workspace (G Suite) instead of a provider like ProtonMail.

Using a custom domain with Google's paid service seems like the least drastic change and you get to keep using all their services. Maybe the support won't be as good, but the products and integrations are probably better than any other provider.

And as long as you do regular backups of your Google data, I think this seems like a good solution.

Re: Google users locked out after 15 years' use

#160

Post by Daniel_sk »

GekkePrutser wrote: post #153
grandpoobah wrote: post #147

This article finally prompted me to do what I should've done a long time ago, which is to create a Fastmail account and begin importing my Gmail into it. I've seen this story far too many times, and no longer will I say "yeah but it'll never happen to me". Setting up the import was insanely easy, and my Fastmail account is now configured to enable me to send using my Gmail address from directly within Fastmail. Plus…

But even then you have to trust FastMail not to lock you out. Sure it's a paid service so less likely and I'm sure their customer service is better. But it doesn't fix the root issue of being dependent on one party.

If you combine it with a paid domain, then you can transfer your email provider even when locked out. Of course you risk loosing your emails, but you can setup a desktop client to always download all your emails or do periodic backups.
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