GOOGLE IS DELETING MY ACCOUNT!

[Koldov]

Ok, so it's not a big deal really... sorry for the dramatic thread title!

 

However, I just received an email from Google telling me that an account I have is to be deleted...

 

"You're receiving this message because your Google Account has not been used in at least 8 months.

 

If you want to keep your Google Account, sign in to it before June 29, 2024. Take a moment now to sign in to your Google Account.

 

If you do not sign in to your Google Account before June 29, 2024, Google will delete your Google Account and its activity and data."

 

The thing is I do seem to remember this Google account, it was set-up over 7 years ago and is one of at least 10 accounts we created to assign licenses to our iPads.

 

I think this was back in the day before ASM and even before VPP, iirc you had to create an account that you could assign the apps to and then sign in to 5 or so iPads with it to get the apps on each of them. Not sure why we made Google accounts instead of Apple accounts, but we had a 3rd-party consultant back then as we'd never had iPads before and that's what they told us to do...

 

Seems ridiculous now so I'm not even sure if I've got it right, but the main questions are:

 

Do Google delete inactive accounts?

 

Why now, is it a recent thing?

 

Does this mean that all such old, abandoned accounts will eventually be purged?

[6Foot2]

I can't remember when I sent up my preferences, but it was quite some time ago:

 

Link: About Inactive Account Manager - Google Account Help

 

... What happens when your account gets deleted?

 

Deleting your Google Account will affect all products associated with that account (e.g., Blogger, AdSense, Gmail), and affect each product differently. You can review the data associated with your account on the Google Dashboard. If you use Gmail with your account, you'll no longer be able to access that email. You'll also be unable to reuse your Gmail username ...

[elsiegee40]

Google sent out emails earlier this year about deleting inactive accounts. You have to have physically logged in to them recently to preserve them I think.

[Koldov]

Thanks, another reason for this being a good thing for me is that a few years ago our Headteacher decided (without any consultation of course) that he wanted a better 'electronic' calendar...

 

He decided that he would create all staff a (personal) Google account... to make matters worse he decided that he would use our O365 Domain name to create these accounts and to top it all off ignored the fact that once we had created a school Google Workspace (for Classroom and distance learning over lockdown), we could have transferred it over.

 

You can imagine the hilarity that ensued with staff having to sign-in to two separate Google accounts and the SLT deciding that they were going to use the 'personal' accounts for sharing 'SLT stuff' in their drives...

 

Anyway, it's all sorted now and we are using the school Google Workspace exclusively, however... it has been suggested (by me) that all staff now sign-in to their old 'personal' Google accounts and delete them.

 

Unfortunately as I'm sure you all know this is NEVER going to happen, so unless I force the issue and literally stand over the shoulder of each of the 60+ staff members and watch them do it (plus the agony of at least 90% of them not remembering their passwords - with no way to reset them - and a good percentage 'who aren't very good with computers') there isn't much I can do.

 

Should I just drop it and hope Google will eventually delete these accounts..?

[Brimstone]

If these accounts were being used for Apple ID's for apps still being used on the iPads then you will lose access to update those apps if the accounts are deleted

 

if you are still using them, you will need to change the email address being used, you can do this at appleid.apple.com

 

Btw, VPP was around and available before iPads even existed.....

[Koldov]

Thanks, yes the Google accounts in my original post were indeed used as Apple IDs (back before MDMs when you had to use one Apple ID to assign the app to 5 devices iirc). I'm hopeful we have left all that behind quite a few years ago now and that there aren't any apps that we use now linked to those as we use a singular VPP/ASM account now for app 'purchases' (always the free ones!).

 

Volume Purchase Program originally for Macs I guess?