Google has stated that it will begin removing unused personal accounts that have not been accessed for at least two years.
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Gmail, Google Docs, Google Drive, Google Meet, and Google Calendar are among the services affected, as is information in Google Workspace, YouTube, and Google Photos.
However, Ruth Kricheli, Google’s Vice President of Product Management, guarantees that this policy spreads solely to personal Google accounts and will not affect those for organizations such as schools or corporations.
Google will issue many reminders in the months leading up to the cancellation of an account. These emails will be sent “to both the account and recovery email addresses.”
Google is taking this step for security concerns.
Google claims that abandoned accounts are at least ten times less likely than active accounts to have two-step verification enabled – and are thus frequently accessible to wrongdoers.
Abandoned accounts frequently depend on obsolete or re-used passwords that may have been compromised, lack two-factor authentication, and are subject to fewer security checks by the user.
Once an account has been infiltrated, it can be exploited for anything from essence theft to serving as a conduit for undesired or malicious content, such as spam.
How can you keep your Google account safe?
Google suggests that you sign in to your Google Account once every two years to keep your account alive and your photos and material from being erased.
Reading or sending an email, using Google Drive, watching a YouTube video, installing an app from the Google Play Store, using Google Search, or signing in to a third-party app or service are all instances of activity that will contribute to keeping your account “active.”
It is also critical to supply a recovery email at sign-up and to keep this recovery email up to date in your account settings.
To keep your data safe, keep your account active by signing in once every two years and providing a recovery email.
