Sunday, February 12, 2012

Google Nightmare

Have you ever tried to open your blog and been told that it has been deleted?

Have you ever tried to open your email and been told that it has been locked due to suspicious activity?

It's not fun.

Here's something nicer:
Crepe myrtle (Lagerstroemia indica) in my garden this week. This dark pink one flowers later than the others.

You can unlock your email account by providing a mobile number which has not been "used up".  Google will send you an unlocking code by SMS. Unfortunately my mobile was "used up" a few years ago when they added the mobile number requirement with no warning and I had a class full of students in the process of creating Gmail accounts and only one mobile in the room - mine. I haven't used Gmail for email classes since that Google nightmare.

Something else nice:
Scaevola flowering in my garden this week. Colour not quite as in real life - the usual purple problem.

You also have the option of having the unlocking code sent to a fixed-line phone. But Google didn't like the way I entered the number. No clues on how they wanted it formatted, just that I was formatting it incorrectly. Did they need the country code? Should I put the "0" in the area code or not? Google wasn't going to tell me.

Anyway, I'm back, and I have no idea what suspicious activity caused Google to lock my email and "delete" my blog. But I'm feeling a little nervous. And I just changed my default search engine to Bing.

11 comments:

thornberry said...

Hi there Vireya - I have had that happen to my blog. But it was relatively easy for me to "fix" the problem - I provided the information that wordpress wanted, and it was all okay. Who knows what goes on with the technology! But the thought of having lost all my blog posts - oh my. Glad that yours is up and running!

Nikki said...

Sheesh..... scary nightmare!

Chiara Z said...

Ow! I wondered what was happening. Sounds like Google was definitely NOT being your friend . . . I hope Bing behaves nicely for you.

kaiteM said...

how horrible, same thing happened to Mary Anne in Canada, took her a week or more to get it fixed. some people have moved off blogger to typepad for that reason. glad you're back safely, hope it's ok now. the flowers are pretty anyway.

Terry said...

Distressing saga Even more so in the middle of class. Always hated when something went south and I couldn't recover with students.

Like the blooms. Enjoy today Oh glad your back

Vireya said...

Using Bing is just my little protest. It won't change who owns Blogger or Gmail.

Vireya said...

Thank you! In that class I ended up with half the students on Gmail and half on Yahoo mail. Very difficult with complete beginners, to have their screen looking completely different to what I was showing on the projector.

Vireya said...

It didn't take me that long fortunately, but it did make me realise how vulnerable your stuff can be if it is in the hands of a large corporation who can deny you access on a whim.

Vireya said...

Thanks! Me too! It obviously wasn't really deleted, but it is a scary word. Interestingly according to the stats, other people looked at the blog during the time I was being told it had been deleted.

Vireya said...

Yep! And I still feel nervous about what I will find when I log in.

Jo-anne Blossy said...

I had that happen to one of my blogs. It's very scary indeed. I had no idea what the suspicious content was either :(
Love the crepe myrtle. That colour is so pretty :)