Friday, June 18, 2010

Sh!t Happens

On June 3rd I awoke to find this message on my Google home page. I immediately changed my password and also stopped my mail from being forwarded to a Yahoo account. Then I took the kids to school and realized that I sent everybody in my contact list this email. I replied to a few friends and acquaintances that it was spam and posted the email on my blog. My home phone and cell phone were ringing all morning. I even got one person to reverse the Western Union funds transfer that he was sending me. I honestly never realized that there were people who existed in the outer perimeter of my life that cared so much about me.


But then I was logged out of my own account. The hacker changed my password and I could not log back in. It took me 15 days to convince Google that I was me.

Ya see, Google products are free, so they don't have to provide ANY customer support. I was able to post my problem on a forum and some anonymous Google volunteer would tell me that they could not help me. Eventually, I realized that Google owed me money. There are ads on my blog and I no longer have access to my Adsence account . I posted there and eventually was able to prove that I was me and got my account back.

My lack of access to my Google was much more frustrating that I imagined it could be. I had no idea how many eggs I put in that basket. Blogger, G-mail, Picassa, Groups, ( I was the only administrator of a Group for my running club). So if you are reading this...back up your email account now....


and
If you are a blogger, you must set up a new account that has administrative access to you blog so if you ever get one account hijacked you can get you blog back

6 comments:

  1. Geez. That is crazy freaky. Some people! Glad you worked it out!

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hey Michael, I am happy that you are
    up and running again....

    ReplyDelete
  3. Wow, someone actually sent you money?

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  4. Welcome back. Did your Western Union sender get a stern lecture about the pitfalls of being overly trusting? Though it's probably nice to know SOME ONE would help you out in a time of desperation!

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  5. Hope you're also checking your credit card statements carefully.

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  6. Welcome back!

    You'd be surprised how much you use Google. If you do, go to Gmail, then click on 'my account' they will list all the services you use. My account lists 24 services, half of which I don't recall using.

    ReplyDelete

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