NY- Alphabet Inc’s Google announced Tuesday that starting in December it will delete accounts that have not been used for two years in an effort to prevent security threats, including hacks.
The company said that if a Google account hadn’t been used or signed into for at least two years, it could delete the account and content through Google Workspace, which includes Gmail, Docs, Drive, Meet, and Google. Calendar, as well as YouTube and Google Photos.
The policy change only applies to personal Google Accounts and not to those of organizations like schools or businesses.
In 2020, Google had said that it would delete content stored in an inactive account, but it would not delete the account itself.
Starting this Tuesday, Google will send several notifications to the account email address and recovery email of inactive accounts before deleting them.
Last week, Elon Musk said Twitter would remove accounts that have been inactive for several years and archive them, saying the move is “important to freeing up abandoned handles.”
With information from Reuters
