Added: On further investigation it seems Google detected some sort of unusual activity on my account, assumed it was a hijack in progress, and disabled everything until I could verify my identity with them and reset the account. Fortunately I was online when it happened and was able to deal with everything immediately. I've since backed up what I didn't already have saved from the blog and added a few additional security measures to protect my content.
I don't think I can describe how upsetting it is to see the last decade of your online writing life vanish as if it never existed. I do have every year saved, but as I was thinking of how much work it would be to recreate the blog I admit, I felt quite discouraged. I might start a mirror blog in private somewhere and start copying the content there in case this happens again. In the meantime, if you have a blog but have not backed up your content, you might want to make an effort, just in case.
I'm not exactly sure how to back up my blog...but losing everything is sure an incentive to figure it out...!!!
ReplyDeleteSo glad you got it all back. That is not a fun feeling to experience.
ReplyDeleteAbout 18 months ago, Google flagged my blog as spam and deleted the entire blog. I panicked. SPAM? I was publishing original content 5-7 days per week, and it their algorithms determined it was spam. At the time this represented 3.5 years of blogging, and it was a huge blow. Luckily, like you, Google gave me a limited time to verify I was a human and running a legit blog, but I know others that never got that chance. I did get back all of my blog and eventually migrated over to a self-hosted WP blog. BUT, with that said, I back up my entire blog and its databases weekly. Even more frequently if I make big changes or add a lot of new content at once. I strongly encourage everyone who has a blog to back it up at least weekly.
Terlee: It depends on what blog platform you use, but if you Google "how to back a [Google/WP, etc.] blog," you should be able to find the information.
Eek! I didn't know this could happen. Or how to back up a blog. Thanks to Jen for the tip.
ReplyDeleteI lost a years old blog to a stupid mistake of mine... I had a backup and when my blog got goofy, I don't know, a database was corrupted, something. I never was sure what it was, but I don't think it was malicious. Instead of putting the back up on top of the bad one... you see where this is going don't you? I moved the corrupted copy/database(s) onto my good one... my only back-up... so yeah. That's when I realized back-ups need to exist in two places at once because I'm able to wreck one completely by accident and then I have nothing... that was a blow. I totally understand where you're coming from and am glad you got things back under control.
ReplyDelete