from Hacker News

Ask HN: How do I prove that a certain Gmail account does indeed belong to me?

by sebkomianos on 7/5/18, 1:01 AM with 24 comments

I understand that this submission might not be one of the best for Hacker News, in terms of knowledge shared, but along with the gmail account I am talking about and two or three other websites/communities, HN has been one of the longest-living places I find myself at in those ~15 years that I have been online. So, trying to avoid unnecessary details, here's the story:

On Monday morning I signed in to my gmail account from a print shop in my hometown in order to access an email that was sent to me and print an attached document. I logged in from one of the shop's desktops, printed the document and then I tried to sign out from my account. However, I, at first, got a blank page and I had to reload it in order for the process to be completed.

Since then, I have been unable to log in to my account because of a wrong password and when I try "recover account" I can't prove that I am its real owner as I can't seem to recall the exact month that I created it, more than 10 years ago (2007)! However, if I was given the opportunity I would be able to give a very detailed description of the contents of this account in terms of emails received and sent, labels, folders, etc etc.

Now, apart from this gmail account being the centre of my control for all of my profile in different websites, forums, newsletters, etc, there are a couple of received emails in there that hold a very strong emotional value for me and I just can't get how such a thing can happen!

  • by adyavanapalli on 7/5/18, 7:53 PM

    I had the literally the exact same thing happen to me about a month ago. The automated account recovery provided by Gmail was not helping the least bit, and I desperately needed to talk to a human. I ended up creating a Twitter bot to tweet at the Gmail team every 12 hrs or so complaining about how I couldn't recover my account even though I had it for 10+ years, and about three days later, they responded and helped me through a streamlined recovery process that helped reset my password.

    You don't need to create a Twitter bot like me, but I would try tweeting at @gmail or @google once a day until they respond. Good luck!

  • by sam_goody on 7/5/18, 9:58 PM

    I have two Gmail accounts.

    One morning about six months ago, when I tried to login to both (one after the other) from a browser, Google responded that I have the wrong password. (I guess this is possible, since I don't login from a browser often. But I don't think so, and certainly not on both accounts!)

    Since I still have access to incoming mail using the Apple Mail client and the accounts are linked (the backup of each is the other account), I asked for a password reset and got the code, but when I try to reset the password on Gmail, it won't let me. It says it cannot verify that I am myself - on either account.

    The cell phone I used when setting up the accounts some ~10 years ago are no longer in my possession, and I don't remember exactly when I created the account. I have older passwords 100% sure (written down) but Google won't accept them. I tried using the date of the latest email I have in mail, but that didn't work (am pretty sure that there were older mails that the client deleted).

    I have no idea how to recover the password via the Apple mail client, and could not find instructions online anywhere. Any help would be appreciated.

    ATM, I cannot login to photos, docs, or anything that is not accessible from the mail client. I don't know what to do if the mail ever stops connecting.

    The fact that there is no recourse from G, and that they won't even honor the reset code they send me (while still letting me send and receive mail), is ..scary. But is also irresponsible and destructive - I have lost all access to family wedding photos, to older contracts, to who knows what else.

  • by whatyoucantsay on 7/5/18, 7:49 PM

    Google has willfully abdicated its responsibility to the hundreds of millions of people whose digital lives they manage. Whether the product is paid in cash or the erosion of privacy, this kind of failure can ruin lives.

    People choose to rely upon Google, but Google has spent tens of billions of dollars influencing us to do so.

  • by kixpanganiban on 7/5/18, 1:15 AM

    https://support.google.com/accounts/answer/7682439?hl=en

    Iirc, last time something similar happened to me, I was able to prove my identity by answering questions such as email addresses of recent email senders.

    PS: You might be better off posting this somewhere like Quora.

  • by sebkomianos on 7/9/18, 5:25 PM

    An update:

    A week in, Google has yet to get in touch with me despite all the recovery and contact attempts I have made (see here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17460270 and here: https://twitter.com/sebkkom/status/1015246317096927232). Utterly ridiculous for a company of its calibre and a service of its size and importance, to say the least.

    Despite me getting the hell out of it, I would like to say a big “thank you” to Yggiz who is the person that hacked the account for not causing any financial or personal damage and for showing me a couple of very weak, in terms of security, spots here and there.

  • by verbify on 7/5/18, 8:02 PM

    Can you remember who you would've been in touch with in 2007? For me, I would simply email my friends from that era, and ask them to find the earliest correspondence from that address. That should give you the month you opened your account.

  • by vivan on 7/6/18, 12:59 PM

    I have had the same thing happen to me. My primary email address was hacked and Google wouldn't do anything about it. This was the address I used for absolutely everything - including my PayPal! Fortunately I didn't end up losing all that much in the end, except for a rather nice email address (my full name @gmail.com) and my Wordpress/Gravatar account.

  • by browda on 7/6/18, 1:35 PM

    You’re not alone (http://babeingeekland.blogspot.com/2018/06/an-open-letter-to...) but if you are persistent and happen to have a computer that Google knows, you should be able to recover.

  • by lsiebert on 7/6/18, 12:37 AM

    For future reference, is there a quick way to look up which month my account was created in, before something like this happens?

  • by mabynogy on 7/5/18, 11:11 PM

    Ask people whom you have send mails (like your family) to forward you all they received from you. You can find meaningful informations and keys in the headers that might help you to prove that.

  • by kevinherron on 7/5/18, 9:16 PM

    When this happens does having a recovery email account set up help or no?