The Greyman's Online Account Gets Suspended
Sometimes it's not an individual who is the adversary...
My previous newsletters have shared ways to protect your online life from “The Bad People” or “The Adversary.” As we have seen from recent events, we need to face the possibility that the tech company who hosts your online account may block or suspend access to your account based on “policy violation.” It could be a post or reply that you make which contain words or phrases flagged by the tech company’s algorithm. It could be a combination of purchases that the tech company’s algorithm flags as suspicious. Or it could be simply taking pictures of your child, which get auto-uploaded to that tech company’s servers, that gets flagged by an algorithm as possible child abuse.
Losing access to your important online account doesn’t have to be from an Adversary in another country illegally compromising and changing your password. Your Adversary might be the tech company itself.
So what does one do when a personal email account is blocked or suspended for “violating company policy” in some manner? Since a number of people have Gmail as their personal email service, I’m going to use Google in this example.
The Ineffective Approach
Angry-tweet or angry-post on social media complaining about your account getting blocked. Might be difficult to do if your social media account, e.g. Twitter or F-book, is suspended for various reasons that offend their respective algorithms. Wring hands and experience increased stress knowing you have important emails coming into your personal Gmail, but can’t get to it.
The Good Approach
Attempt to regain access to your Google account by navigating their online recovery process. Acknowledge the similarities you have with Frodo Baggins and Samwise Gamgee as you begin your own journey to Mordor to recover your Google account. Acknowledge the discouragement in your tummy when reading Google’s online account recovery documentation stating, “For your security, you can't call Google for help to sign into your account. [Google doesn’t] work with any service that claims to provide account or password support. Do not give out your passwords or verification codes.”
The Gooder Approach
Download an archive of your Google data (email, calendar appointments, documents, photos, and more) with Google Takeout. Depending the size of the data you are exporting, you might be able to add it directly to another cloud service such as Dropbox, Box, or Microsoft OneDrive. Exhale slightly knowing you at least have your data in a chunk of files in case of emergency.
The Goodest Approach
Use a cross-platform mail application like Thunderbird to create an IMAP connection with your GMail account. Raise an eyebrow of satisfaction knowing you have a copy of all your emails on your local computer and online in your Google account.
Export your Google Calendar, and all your past events, into an .ics file stored on your local computer. Smile slightly knowing you can import this .ics file into another calendar application anytime SHTF (Stuff Hits the Fan).
The Greyman Approach
Register a custom domain with Namecheap.com, e.g. MyDarnEmail.com, and set up greyman@MyDarnEmail.com as your personal email address moving forward.
Create a new Proton email account, e.g. FluffyBiscuit as a username, and connect your custom domain to Proton Mail.
Import your Gmail into your Proton Mail account with Easy Switch.
Set up an IMAP connection with your new Proton Mail account to have a copy of all your emails on your desktop computer. Back up this local copy every three months to an external hard drive.
Set up automatic forwarding in Gmail to greyman@mydarnemail.com in your Gmail settings.
Inform your friends and family that you have a new personal email address: greyman@mydarnemail.com. Politely ask them to update their contact info with your new information.
Import your .ics calendar archive from Google into your Proton Calendar.
After a timeframe of your choosing, perform one last Google Takeout to archive the latest data to be exported to your computer, and cancel your Google account knowing your personal emails from friends and family are now using your new MyDarnEmail.com address.
Put your feet up, exhale deeply, and smile knowing that you have a local copy of your all your email. Plus, should Proton Mail suspend your account for any reason, you can quickly move your greyman@MyDarnEmail.com domain in Namecheap to another email service such as Tutanota.