Google to permanently delete dormant accounts
The tech giant is already sending emails to those affected and encouraging them to avoid being victims of hackers by making their accounts active.
Tech giant Google says all dormant Google accounts will be permanently deleted effective December this year (2023).
The tech giant, which revealed this in a statement issued recently, said that the purge will affect accounts that have been dormant for at least two years and that people owning them stand to lose personal data such as emails, documents, spreadsheets, calendar appointments, photos, and saved videos.
According to the Independent, a publication in the United Kingdom, the American tech giant introduced the policy early this year with the aim of protecting active Google users from security threats such as phishing scams and account hijacking.
In a statement on one of its blogs, Google said that accounts that have been inactive for years are at risk of being hacked as they may use the same passwords that have been compromised in other security breaches, which are easily available on the dark web.
The tech giant is already sending emails to those affected and encouraging them to avoid being victims of hackers by making their accounts active.
If a person loses access to their Gmail account, they can also be unable to use other services and websites linked to that email address, even if they have nothing to do with Google.
Google customers are encouraged to send or receive emails, use Google Drive, download apps from the Google Play Store, or just perform a Google search while logged in to their account in order to keep it active and prevent it from being erased.
According to Google, any account that has posted a video to YouTube will also not be impacted, regardless of when it was last active.
Additional information from The Independent and Google blog
About Post Author
