The Kenzers Family Blog

I just want to highlight a post I read over at rebellin.net. Lynnette, who I’ve had the pleasure of working with over the years, was sitting by her computer when she started seeing emails saying her eBay and Gmail passwords have successfully been changed. Since she didn’t change them, she rightfully started to freak out and picked up the phone. She was immediately able to get a hold of eBay (and PayPal I presume) to get the situation fixed. However, calls to Google to correct the Gmail password went unanswered - apparently they don’t provide any phone customer support. She has since submitted 5 contact forms to Google with no response.

Gmail tells its users not to delete email. They have enough storage space and such fantastic search capabilities, that they don’t see the point. Now, Lynnette has over two years of undeleted emails being pilfered by some hacker. Many sites email you passwords when you forget them, and I know - since I use Gmail - that I don’t always delete these. This hacker now has access to all kinds of Lynnette’s information. Google: You have to treat this with the same seriousness as a credit card fraud case would be!

Just a tip - and I’m not insinuating that Lynnette didn’t do this - but change your passwords frequently. Its easy to get into a rhythm of using the same password over and over but you need to change it with all systems as frequently as you can muster.