Recovering a stolen Gmail account

MrA2012

I'm trying to help family members who have unfortunately had their Gmail account stolen, but am running out of ideas as to how to get it back under their control.  I'm afraid most of what follows is based on what I've been told over the phone, so I hope I've got the details correct.

The fraudster has somehow managed to access their Gmail account and has changed the password, the recovery email address and the recovery phone number.  So resetting the password using one of those recovery options isn't possible.

I suggested they try the account recovery page here:

https://accounts.google.com/signin/v2/recoveryidentifier?flowName=GlifWebSignIn&flowEntry=AccountRecovery

But apparently after bypassing the options to use the recovery email address or phone number, the only option is to enter a new recovery email address.  When they do that, they receive a code to enter on the site, after which they are told their identity will be verified within 48 hours.  Unfortunately before this happens they are informed that a successful login to their account has since occurred and therefore the recovery process has been cancelled.  Presumably this successful login was the fraudster.

Does anyone know of a method to regain control of a Gmail account using security questions, or something they will still have access to?  Alternatively, is there a way of deleting the account and it's contents when you can't log in to it any more?  Even better, is there a way to actually talk to someone at Google to get help with the situation?

Any advice or previous experience with a similar situation would be helpful, thanks!

Neil_Jones

Well as a general rule this sort of situation implies the original password was too weak in the first place.

The easiest solution is just to abandon it, change the registered email addresses on websites you use it on and use a stronger password o(and two factor auth) on the new account.

MrA2012

I've told them they will probably have to create a new account and start again.  The problem though is that the old account will still be in the hands of the fraudster, with access to all their old emails.  Is there a way to delete it?  The only way I can find requires being logged in, which is no longer possible unless they can regain access.

[Deleted User]

The urgent thing to do now is put a block on all online accounts that use that email address because otherwise the person that gained access can reset password on any of them.

Recovering that email address might be a lengthy process, and in the meantime, the hacker can get into any online account that uses that email address if it has simple email based password resets.

Neil_Jones

Email is not secure and this is why.  Never keep anything in it that's sensitive or useful or that you want to keep.

In all honesty the whole point of getting an email address like this is to gain access to PayPal and other resources by resetting those passwords.  Whoeever's taken it doesn't really care whats in ityour inbox but if its tied to a Paypal/eBay/other online payment request (which itself may be protected by a poor password/no 2 factor authentication) then they're in.  And that's what its all about.

eleventhirtytwo

You could try calling at one of the numbers here: https: //about.google/contact-google/

They may need proof of  id.

Once you regain access I'd suggest setting up 2 factor authentication.

MrA2012

Thanks, I've passed that link on to them.

I had a look at the tips on that site too.  It looks like they followed the correct procedure before as far as I can tell, but were never asked any questions because the verification procedure was aborted due to somebody else being logged in to their account at the time.  Hopefully another attempt will get them further.