Google Cloud suspended my account for 2 years, only automated replies

My Google account has been suspended from GCP since March 2024.

I have submitted multiple appeals through ts-consult@google.com over 2 years. Every time I get the same automated template asking me to explain, I reply with details, then nothing. No human ever responds.

Case: #1-8622000037271

Timeline: - March 2024: Suspended, appeal submitted - April 2024: Automated requests for info, I replied - Nov 2024: More automated emails, I replied again - Dec 2024 - now: Complete silence

I am a CS researcher at UC Berkeley. This has seriously impacted my work.

Has anyone successfully gotten Google to review a GCP suspension appeal? How do you reach a human?

It's gone. No human will ever respond to you. That's how these companies operate. From here, you realistically have two options.

1. Forget the account and move on. You could create a new one, but nobody can tell how long it would take before that gets suspended as well.

2. If the suspension has a tangible negative impact on your profession, hire a lawyer and get proper legal advice.

Most important of all, let this be a lesson for you and your colleagues. It is a terrible idea to let any critical part of your life depend on unregulated industries that can wipe out someone's livelihood at the whim of machine learning systems. Learn this lesson and pass it on to everyone you know.

As an individual, you are nobody to Google and you have no leverage. It is reckless to build your livelihood or profession around their platforms. If you were a company, your team could speak to an account manager and negotiate. As an individual, your only real leverage is legal action.

Stories like this appear every month. I don't know how many more it will take before it becomes best practice not to depend on these utterly abominable rackets for anything critical.

Has AWS support gone downhill in the last two years? I've worked with them in the past - as both an individual and a couple startups - I always reached a human. Issues weren't always resolved as quickly as I'd like but response times were short.

This is such a repetitious issue that I wonder why there has been no class action suits so far?

I think documenting these cases somewhere, and targeting not just Alphabet but all the other "we're too big to support little people like you" companies would be a good idea. I don't think the pay out would be significant, but the punitive impact might change things.

if you want best support (while staying with big cloud) then Microsoft is the best .

Azure has its flaws but Microsoft puts a lot of people and effort behind it . We are not that large but there are so many instances where Microsoft reps will come in call with our customers or their people working with common customers will help out etc.

AWS has a done a decent job of taking enterprise business seriously last 10 years. you can get human support but generally they will charge you , I.e if better support you want you have to pay for premium support plans .

They are constrained unlike MS they don’t have non-cloud large enterprise business relationships for decades M365 or AD etc that helps with building the enterprise DNA.

In all three clouds it works best if you don’t buy directly, buy through a partner reseller , who both have the relationships to the CSP and have the people to work with you .