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"Trust Me! - It's My Blog!" Is A Useless Tactic

Some blog owners make no effort to remember their account name / password - then become unhappy when Blogger won't bend their rules, to accommodate them.
Google cut off my access to my account, when it went through changes several years ago. I can't login - and I really want access to my blog!
As long as account / blog recovery has to be restricted, to protect us against blog theft, some blog owners will be unable to use the recovery process - because they don't have the necessary details, to verify themselves.

Blogger needs to protect everybody's Blogger accounts and blogs, against people who want to misuse the recovery process.

Similar to identity verification required when you travel to a distant land, and try to login to Blogger, you should expect some extra security when you try to resurrect a dormant account and / or blog.

Regular Use Allows More Reliable Identification.

If you use your Blogger account daily, and from the same computer in the same location, every time that you login, Blogger can pretty much trust that you are the same person, each time.

Short of breaking into your house when you're not home, figuring out your accounts and passwords, and using your computer during the breakin, nobody is going to successfully pass themselves off as you, and hijack or steal your actively used account and blogs.

Some Blogger Use Is More Common To Abusive Activity.

Conversely, if you use the same computer, from the same location - then one day travel to Nigeria or the Ukraine, and use a computer in a coffeeshop, Blogger is going to suspect that you may not be a legitimate blog owner.

Chances are, when a coffeeshop computer in Nigeria or Ukraine is being used, it is not a legitimate blog owner using it. This is simply because too many account and blog hijacks have been conducted, from coffeeshop computers in Nigeria and Ukraine.

Similarly, when you try to login to a long dormant account or publish an inactive blog, Blogger will require extra effort by you, to prove that you are the owner. The longer the account or blog remains dormant, the more problem this will present.

  • Dormant accounts and blogs attract hijack attempts.
  • Dormant accounts and blogs are harder to recover control.

This is a simple Blogger security precaution. It's not Blogger being capricious, pedantic, or vengeful - because you've been inattentive, or lax in your duty, as a blog owner.

Dormant accounts and blogs attract hijack attempts.

Some blog thieves target dormant accounts and blogs. It's easier to steal a dormant blog - and to keep what is stolen - simply because a dormant blog is more likely to never be missed, by the lawful owner.

The longer you leave your blog unpublished, the more chance there is that somebody will try to hijack it.

Dormant accounts and blogs are harder to recover control.

The longer that you leave your blog unpublished, the more chance that you will change. You will move to a different location, get a new computer, get a new phone, change jobs and have a new email address, and so on.

The longer that you leave your account or blog owner dormant, the more chance that you will be unable to recover control, because you won't have the necessary backup identity tokens.

For reliable use of Blogger, use it regularly.

Like the muscles in your body, which atrophy when you don't use them, it is going to involve some pain when you try to re activate an unused Blogger account and blog(s). This is simple reality.

And if you use Blogger irregularly, setup Google 2-Step Verification.

Comments

If a person wants to change from one blog account to another some people put a redirect on their old accounts. Others just seem to put up a goodbye message. Is there anyway to protect your old account from hijacks when you move to another? Or is it possible to actually take the blog down?
Nitecruzr said…
Anne,

Thanks for the question.

In a perfect world, when you decided that you wanted your blog under a new address, you would just change the blog to the new address. This would make the current address available for someone else to use.

Unfortunately, some people don't want to make the effort to create a blog, they just want to take an existing (previously used) address, recover the content (that you just re published under the new address), and re publish the content (your content). That creates a duplication of content, and damages the reputation of your blog.

Also, you have to let your readers know that your blog is still active - you just have a new address.

So you end up having to publish a stub blog, informing your readers what your new address is - and leave it at that.

In a few years, all of your readers will know of your new address - and the search engines will only cache the stub content. You will then be able to delete your stub, and let somebody else have the address. They won't find any cached content to re publish - and they will have to start their new blog, from scratch.

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