Tell HN: Need help, locked out of Google account with 10 years of personal data

242 points · taosx · 19 days ago

I've been locked out of my Google account which contains over a decade of my digital life, and I'm at my wit's end trying to recover it.

The situation:

- Woke up today completely locked out

- Got "secure your account" message

- Set new password + recovery info but kept getting redirected to login

- Received "unusual activity" warning (around the time I was asleep)

- System asks for old phone number (lost in 2022)

- Have tried recovery dozens of times through g.co/recover

- Still have access to old recovery email but system never asks for it it

What I've tried:

- Using same devices and network as always (google pixel)

- Multiple recovery attempts with both old/new phone numbers

- Both old/new passwords (then never say which one they accept)

- Following all official Google recovery guides

I have so much of my life there:

- Primary email communications

- Password manager data

- Business documents and projects

- Personal documents

- Google Drive contents

- Contacts

- OAuth access to numerous services

- Years of irreplaceable data

I've exhausted all official channels and online resources. The thought of permanently losing access to this account is terrifying. Has anyone successfully recovered their account in a similar situation? Any Google employees or security experts who might be able to help?

This account represents my entire digital identity, and I'm desperate for any guidance or assistance.

119 comments

xlaacid · 19 days ago

Moving forward: always have an email client on a local machine downloading a copy of all emails. Have a local copy of all gdrive contents. Backup your password mangers to a txt file and encrypt it on a drive. And above all, dont trust google with all your stuff. They dont care.

I lost a gmail years ago and only use it as a throwaway email client now. You get what you pay for.

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edent · 19 days ago

If you live in the EU, you can send a Subject Access Request to Google.

That will get you back the contents of your account (emails, photos, etc).

You can also try submitting a right to rectification. They hold data about you (your account) but have incorrect data regarding ownership.

If either of those fails, you can escalate to the data protection authority in your jurisdiction.

It is likely to take several weeks though.

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taosx · 18 days ago

This post seems to have been flagged but I want to thank everyone for their suggestions and future measures. The plan for now is: 1. Retry again with email/pass in incognito in a 24 hour interval; 2. Try to get the same phone number from the telecom operators; 3. Make Subject Access Request (EU) to Google in hopes of at least getting my data back.

In order not to get caught up in the same thing again there are many good suggestions in the comments, all with some overhead/friction but 100% worth it if you ask me :D.

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passwordoops · 19 days ago

Upvoting as this usually proves the only effective way to get service.

Try cross-posting to Reddit as well

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jpcom · 18 days ago

Why don't you just contact someone at Google? I would recommend starting an Advertising Campaign and not paying it. You will be surprised how quickly a support number with a real human being at the end appears.

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