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Earlier quoted context omitted.
>Way too risky to use Google services like this tied to your primary account. Google has no problem correlating your accounts unless you know what you're doing and are ready to switch to the cypherpunk mode.
There is realistically no way to evade the account correlation systems that Google (likely) has.
So there was this mysterious black box that decided if your name was "real" or not. At first this didn't support pseudonyms or any kind of anonymity and that's actually really important for any social network. Think of someone seeking help coming to terms with their sexual orientation, gender identity, addiction, eating disorder or whatever. Or simply going against their family's religious wishes. I later worked at Facebook and one thing I'll give them credit for is Groups. FB Groups had an identity that actually couldn't be tied by anyone else to your profile or identity in any other group. That was a good product decision.
Anyway, if your name somehow failed the magic real names filter, your account got banned. Your entire Google account was banned and basically there was no recourse other than knowing someone who worked at the company or making a big enough fuss on Twitter.
Many people, myself included, criticized and protested this decision. You should at least segment Google products. There's absolutely no reason to ban your Gmail account because an automated system decided your Google+ account name wasn't "real". But that feedback was ignored and this was well before the public launch. And the public backlash proved this position correct (IMHO).
But the net effect was that I decided I can't use any other Google product. Let's say a system is launched to find offensive photos and there's a false positive on one of my images in Google Photos. Maybe it's just a hash collision with a known image. And then what? I lose my entire Gmail? Are you kidding me?
It's wild to me that this is still an issue ~15 years later. I think my stance actually isn't strict enough anymore. You probably shouldn't use Gmail at all. I should really find a paid email provider hosted entirely in Europe, preferably Switzerland or some other country with strong pro-user regulation.
So I have no idea if this Gemini story is true or not. I say that because 95% of the things on Reddit are completely made up. But it is plausible. I wouldn't be surprised if it's true. It means I wouldn't use Gemini at all if I used Gmail.
This is terrifying (I have 2 young kids, but they'll get there). How do I avoid that? When is a Google account considered linked? If I log into 2 google accounts and swap between them, are the accounts considered linked? Also, I have plenty of photos of my kids naked when they were little (my son refused to wear anything for 1 year), do I have to be concerned?
>Also, I have plenty of photos of my kids naked when they were little (my son refused to wear anything for 1 year), do I have to be concerned? This is America, of course you have to be concerned. Google has family groups where you invite people to your family. I'm assuming they had that set up. I guess if you want to manage your children's accounts you have to do it from a burner Google account.
I do have backup of my photos and drive, but I appreciate Google Sheets and would like to keep using that.
God, this is a real nightmare. I'm pretty reticent to rush to regulation, but I really don't know what other solution is even possible here. The average person cannot realistically exist in a digital vacuum, self-hosting their entire online world. Google should not be able to do this to them. No one should have to rely on trying to whip up public mobs on Reddit or HN to get Google to give them access to their own fre…
> I'm pretty reticent to rush to regulation, but I really don't know what other solution is even possible here. Before rushing to assume regulation is necessary, we should question if this story is real at all. It has a lot of signs of being a creative writing exercise like the conflicting details about all of their accounts being banned, including recovery emails, but then later they received an email explaining the…
Why does reddit end up deleting so many of the threads that end up receiving any attention? It's so hard to follow anything now when you go to the site and all there is is [removed]
It was also oddly focused on email access instead of the obvious legal problems that would come from having your account flagged for CSAM. It’s like what someone would write if they were trying to imagine a story about getting locked out of their email but didn’t realize that their CSAM and child endangerment plot point would trigger much bigger legal concerns and consequences
> All my emails, all my documents saved in Google Drive. I would think someone whose business depends on gmail would use an email client, at least periodically, to download their emails.
Another consideration: kids do not have the ability to think ahead and consider future consequences. It's one of the last functions of the brain to develop, and it doesn't fully complete until, often, you've already finished college. Looking through the comments in the reddit thread, it appears the daughter had her dissertation on her google drive and lost it despite having done nothing wrong herself.
And just the final point I want to drive home: these people lost their google accounts because of what someone else did. Nobody thinks ahead to account for something like that.
At what point are we going to start looking at digital mail the same way we do physical mail? It's equally as important today. It needs protections, regulations, and oversight.
> All my emails, all my documents saved in Google Drive. I would think someone whose business depends on gmail would use an email client, at least periodically, to download their emails.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I'm pretty reticent to rush to regulation, but I really don't know what other solution is even possible here. Before rushing to assume regulation is necessary, we should question if this story is real at all. It has a lot of signs of being a creative writing exercise like the conflicting details about all of their accounts being banned, including recovery emails, but then later they received an email explaining the…
Even if it is fiction it is certainly possible for Google to get people into serious trouble by blocking their accounts.