Resold Google Pixel - got a Google account block or why you should not keep all your eggs in one basket

Many technology lovers, after the news of the imminent release of a Google smartphone, began to look forward to the appearance of the device on the market. After the device came out, reviews began to appear on the Web and in print media - mostly positive ones. The phone, despite the relatively high price (from $ 750) began to be bought up.

Some buyers decided to make some money. Having purchased the device from Project Fi, a virtual carrier from Google, they began selling it to a reseller in New Hampshire (the company is not called), the tax-free state of the United States. All this was done for a simple purpose - the reseller company, after selling the phones, transferred part of the profit to the seller. Everything seems to be fine - everyone is happy. But then the corporation itself intervened.

For many years, the company from New Hampshire used the opportunity to resell phones from Google (formerly only branded), without encountering any opposition from Google. But now everything went wrong .

In Google’s terms, it’s indicated that you can only purchase your phone for personal use. The buyer "can only purchase devices for personal use and does not have the right to resell the device (Google Pixel, - Ed.) For profit." That is, reselling a smartphone just bought, from the point of view of the corporation, is a violation of its conditions. Previously, as mentioned above, there were no problems.



But now, users working with the reseller got a real problem - their Google accounts were blocked by the corporation. And we are talking about the inability to use any of the Google services. Imagine - for years you added contacts, pictures, worked with the task scheduler and Google calendar, not to mention Google Docs. And suddenly you just lose all your data. Rather, not the data itself, but access to it, which differs little from the destruction of information.

One user said that the company blocked an unused account only because the email address of the account was associated with a Pixel sale transaction.

According to the owner of the site, whose users found the problem, blocking accounts is simply unacceptable: “I do not protect those who violate the terms of the company, but it seems to me that it is too much to block access to the account and all services to everyone that did it ( sold phones - ed.). ” After the account is blocked, mail sent to it from another account is returned to the sender with the note “there is no such address”.

Now it is known about 200 users whose accounts were blocked by the corporation for the above reason. Moreover, Google has blocked the accounts of all “speculators”, regardless of how many phones were sold to the reseller. Some of them knew that they were violating the terms of the acquisition of Google Pixel, others did not, simply because they did not read the conditions. Actually, few people read them at all.

What, is it all so over? Nothing canbe done?

Can. This time, after the situation became replicated, the company nevertheless decided to remove the blocking of accounts of offending users. In the message that the block will be removed, among other things, the following was said: “We want to remind you that Google users can always export their data and download it from Google services, including Gmail, Photos, Drive at any time, if account active. " It turns out, Google says that "everything is fine now, but better keep a backup of your data." By the way, you can create archives and download them here at this link .

Lesson for the future

We are all so used to online services provided by third-party companies that many of us have completely forgotten about the possibility of blocking an account. Now we are not talking about Google phones and their sale. The thing is that the services of large companies are their property, and user accounts can be blocked at any time if the owners consider it appropriate (in case of violation of any rules, which are usually quite a lot).

So that later it would not be excruciatingly painful, experts recommend doing this:

1. Do not allow a situation where, when you lose access to a service, your work (or life) becomes much more complicated.

Now hundreds of millions of people are associated with a huge number of services that are gradually becoming part of our lives - no more, no less. And losing this part can be very unpleasant. As a result, businessmen can suffer significant losses, office workers - get scolded by their bosses or even get fired, all other users - lose their data, accumulated over the years, forever.

It is clear that without services it is nowhere, but in any case, there is a solution. For example, you need to regularly back up data that you cannot work without.

2. Do not ignore the conditions of work with company services, even if these conditions seem ridiculous.
3. Do not keep all eggs in one basket. It’s best to use several similar services than to depend entirely on a single one. This is not always possible, but you should strive for it.

Sometimes very unusual situations arise that lead to the loss of a user account. For example, one of the Google users lost access to his account after moving to another city. Everything turned out to be blocked - all the services with which he had ever worked. Even an attempt to verify their identity with the help of a special web page offered by Google employees did not help. Employees of the company replied that further use of a Google account is not possible without explaining why.

Not only Google bans accounts. In March, for example, Amazonblocked user accounts that too often returned goods to sellers of the site. Everything went with the account - the money in the account, the months of the purchased subscription to the fast delivery service, the ability to download books to your Kindle.

And OneDrive prohibits storing on its servers everything that is related to the category XXX. Manga, art, films and cartoons of the corresponding genre are prohibited. And yes, the accounts of violators are also banned.

Well, there is only one conclusion - remember that the service you use may not be available at one fine (or not so) moment. So that there is no trouble, try not to depend too much on such a service (or services).