I found out that my elderly mother for the last couple of days could not message me via Google's chat. And I couldn't message her. It was very odd. Eventually after a day of messing with it I noticed that her status was "blocked on Google+".
The kicker is, I never signed up for Google+ and neither signed her up for Google+. Nothing was fixed for days. The only work-around I found was to ... surpise... create a Google+ account. And lo and behold, my mother and other small group of friends ended up in the list of Google+ blocked list. Apparently Google+ block list also overrides regular block lists from other services and does it silently.
Of course I created the stupid Google+ account, unblocked the contacts then immediately deleted it. But it certainly left with a nasty taste in my mouth. It almost seems like a sneaky attempt to make me sign up for Google+.
I kept hearing of stories about people's accounts being locked and them losing their email, contacts, and other data and always thought it was just odd random incidents, now I am starting to get worried. It seems Google is become more aggressive and cavalier with my profile and my data.
(yes, yes, I know I am not paying for it, it is free and I am not a customer, I am the product being sold to their real customers -- the ad buyers).
http://productforums.google.com/forum/#!topic/chat/tA22alXeQ...
I found out that my elderly mother for the last couple of days could not message me via Google's chat. And I couldn't message her. It was very odd. Eventually after a day of messing with it I noticed that her status was "blocked on Google+".
The kicker is, I never signed up for Google+ and neither signed her up for Google+. Nothing was fixed for days. The only work-around I found was to ... surpise... create a Google+ account. And lo and behold, my mother and other small group of friends ended up in the list of Google+ blocked list. Apparently Google+ block list also overrides regular block lists from other services and does it silently.
Of course I created the stupid Google+ account, unblocked the contacts then immediately deleted it. But it certainly left with a nasty taste in my mouth. It almost seems like a sneaky attempt to make me sign up for Google+.
I kept hearing of stories about people's accounts being locked and them losing their email, contacts, and other data and always thought it was just odd random incidents, now I am starting to get worried. It seems Google is become more aggressive and cavalier with my profile and my data.
(yes, yes, I know I am not paying for it, it is free and I am not a customer, I am the product being sold to their real customers -- the ad buyers).