i’m trying to work with a user here now who has an ‘old school’ gmail, no recovery methods, no phone numbers. cannot get in, even with the password as it’s locked into requiring 2fa or some bullshit, which can’t be done because there’s no way to. google offers to send a ‘code’ to an email they provides but they never do. that account is just g.o.n.e.

i have had many others who have been screwed-over by microsoft when they ditched voice calls for verification/2fa, for years they begged and pleaded and conned users into giving up a phone number… any phone number. and so they did. their landlines. they only ever had those landlines associated with their msa and microsoft won’t utilize them anymore. this has spilled over to a several of them losing access to other accounts (in one case, including a number of ipods and ipads used by a family, too) because their ‘hotmail’ is now inaccessible for 2fa or verification/recovery of those non-microsoft accounts.