Gmail hacked

ninjag · 24 Mar 2023 at 20:49

Looking for some advice if anyone would be so kind.

A young family member's gmail account was compromised and the hacker has changed the password as well as any recovery options. Google are being pretty useless saying that they can't verify that he's the owner, despite him being at the same location and internet provider that he always uses. I would have thought the IP address of the hacker would show that someone else is accessing it.

The problem is everything ties back to this gmail account including his Epic account, Instagram, Steam, Discord etc and unfortunately his Microsoft Account including the Operating System being linked to it. The person is systematically changing the passwords on everything, presumably by doing a "forgotten password" request and the link is being sent to the compromised gmail account.

Would anyone have any advice or ideas for regaining control of this gmail account?

ninjag · 25 Mar 2023 at 01:16

Thanks, yeah he said that they weren't very good.

I've managed to install a clean copy of Windows 11 onto it, so unfortunately it's back to square one for everything for him.

This has prompted me to look at my own stuff and Steam seems to have a weakness. I've just added my phone number as a backup, however, if you want to change the phone number there's an option to have a verification code sent to your email. Well that's not much good if your email has been compromised - isn't the whole point of the phone number to keep it ring fenced from the email account?

ninjag · 25 Mar 2023 at 19:01

Thanks all. He has enabled Google 2FA with his new account. I've handed the computer back now with a clean install and said it's best to just start fresh. There was only one game in Steam and also Fortnite so not catastrophic.

ninjag · 25 Mar 2023 at 22:46

I turned on the Microsoft authenticator app 2FA thingy for my own account and that's exactly what I'm looking for. I can't access my Hotmail or Microsoft account without verifying on the phone app. I thought it would only kick in if I made changes and not every time I log in. Nice.