Millions of Google accounts to be deleted in December; here’s why

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Google has been informing users that it will delete millions of Google accounts starting in December as part of a major update.

All personal accounts that have been inactive for two years will be impacted, with emails, photos, calendar, videos and documents being permanently deleted.

The policy was introduced earlier this year to protect users from security threats, including spam, phishing scams and account hijacking.

In a blog post in May, Ruth Kricheli, Google’s vice president of product management, wrote: “Our internal analysis shows abandoned accounts are at least 10x less likely than active accounts to have two-step verification set up. Meaning, these accounts are often vulnerable, and once an account is compromised, it can be used for anything from identity theft to a vector for unwanted or even malicious content, like spam.

“To reduce this risk, we are updating our inactivity policy for Google Accounts to two years across our products. Starting later this year, if a Google account has not been used or signed into for at least two years, we may delete the account and its contents, including content within Google Workspace (Gmail, Docs, Drive, Meet, Calendar) and Google Photos.

“This update aligns our policy with industry standards around retention and account deletion and also limits the amount of time Google retains your unused personal information.”

How to keep your Google account active

The simplest way to keep your account active is to sign-in at least once every two years, Kricheli said.

However, if you have signed into your Google Account or any of its services recently, your account is considered active.

Recent activity when you sign in or while you’re signed in to your account such as reading or sending an email, using Google Drive, watching a YouTube video, downloading an app on the Google Play Store, using Google Search, or using ‘Sign in with Google’ to sign in to a third-party app or service will qualify your account active.

“If you have an existing subscription set up through your account, for example to Google One, a news publication, or an app, we also consider this account activity, and your account will not be impacted. Additionally, we do not have plans to delete accounts with YouTube videos at this time,” Kricheli wrote.

Google has said it will send out multiple notifications before the accounts are deleted.