Almost three years ago, in 2020, Google announced that it would start deleting content from accounts that had been inactive for more than two years. However, the accounts that were “cleaned” remained active after these attacks.
However, now the company has made a more “radical” announcement, where it has announced that it will initiate a policy of deleting inactive accounts, and this time, the deletion will be complete.
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“If a Google account is not used or signed in for at least 2 years, Google will delete that personal account and its contents. In addition to the email address becoming inaccessible, Gmail messages, Calendar events, Drive, Docs and others Workspace files, as well as Google Photos backups, will be removed,” said the Search Giant in communicated.
According to the company, this rule does not extend to YouTube, as some inactive accounts on the platform are linked to channels that contain important videos.
The start of deletions is scheduled for December 2023, and will start on accounts that were created and never used.
Also according to Google, before an account is deleted, its owner will be notified via email, with messages being sent both to the email registered as main, and to the email reservation.
In addition, at least for now, the rule only applies to free and regular user accounts. Accounts linked to large companies and schools will be treated differently.
What keeps a Google account active?
To keep your Google account active and to avoid deletion, you need to log in periodically, at least once every 30 days.
In addition, the following actions may be required:
- Receive and send emails via Gmail;
- Use Google Drive;
- Watch videos on YouTube;
- Download from Google Play;
- Do searches on the Google search engine;
- Login with Google account in third-party apps.
Google also considers the login made on mobile devices that have the Android operating system as an interface to be an activity.
What motivated this initiative?
In the same statement in which it reported the deletion of inactive accounts for more than two years, Google said that this measure aims to maintain the security of accounts and its entire network of services.
The company claims that, because they have been inactive for a long time, accounts that can be deleted are more vulnerable to hacker attacks and can be used by cybercriminals.
Graduated in History and Human Resources Technology. Passionate about writing, today he lives the dream of acting professionally as a Content Writer for the Web, writing articles in different niches and different formats.
