# Need email security suggestions

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-email-security-suggestions/386182>\
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\
**Created:** [December 31, 2006, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-email-security-suggestions/386182 "2006-12-31T03:19:21Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![bittersweet](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/c57346/32.png) [@bittersweet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bittersweet)\
**Post date:** [December 31, 2006, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-email-security-suggestions/386182/1 "2006-12-31T03:19:21Z")

</div>

Hello out there…hope everyone’s having a dandy Saturday night.

I’m having some problems with an individual that I recently broke up with. In a nutshell, he’s not taking things well. He thought it might be a good idea to hack into both my Hotmail and Gmail accounts and change the passwords, delete e-mails, that sort of childish crap. (Mind you, this guy is 34 with three children. What a great role model!)

Anyway, I have e-mailed both Hotmail and Gmail to see what additional security measures can be put in place, if any. Has anyone else had these sort of problems? If so, what did you do to help remedy them?

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Patty\_O\_Furniture](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/96bed5/32.png) [@Patty\_O\_Furniture](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Patty_O_Furniture)\
**Post date:** [December 31, 2006, 4:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-email-security-suggestions/386182/2 "2006-12-31T04:41:06Z")

</div>

Did you choose a secret question (I think Google calls it a security question) when you set up these e-mail accounts? That should be able to get you in to where you can reset the password.

In Google’s [help center](http://mail.google.com/support/bin/answer.py?answer=29407&topic=8262&security=1&ctx=security), they have this:

> [@](#):
>
> Suspicious that someone else is in control of your Gmail account? Let us know by filling out a [Security Report Form](https://services.google.com/inquiry/gmail_security1).

I’m sure Hotmail must have something similar.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![bittersweet](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/c57346/32.png) [@bittersweet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bittersweet)\
**Post date:** [December 31, 2006, 5:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/need-email-security-suggestions/386182/3 "2006-12-31T05:31:22Z")

</div>

I filled out the Security Report Form for Google and also notified Hotmail of the problem. I’m just waiting for them to get back to me. I just thought maybe there was something else I could do in the meantime.