I have this bad feeling daily that for whatever reason I loose access to my gmail. Don’t think of anything shady but simply I just loose it. There is a very small chance to it but still. You can read the stories that people uploaded their family photos to google drive and the algorithm marks their kids photos CP and they loose their account. Or maybe your email is used to spam or anything similar. There is no way to talk to google support, it is an endless loop of help pages. I just can’t live with this. I know billions of people do, but I cannot. My email address is registered to hundreds of websites including government and banking sites. You could literally destroy me financially or other ways by just gaining login to my gmail. Google could cause me HUGE problems by locking me out. I decided to start transitioning to an email with my own domain. I have the doimain, I have the email client setup. So what do you do with your existing stuff? Most websites dont even let you change the email. I have to take appointment in government offices to change my email. It seems like a giant task.
Have anyone took this leap?
*Lose
You could literally destroy me financially or other ways by just gaining login to my gmail.
Sounds like you need to start using MFA.
Just a little at a time. Most sites let you change your email. As you get a message from a site move it to your other email.
I just forwarded my outlook and gmail to my proton. Changed the account I use most and then when an account emails and it gets forwarded it reminds me to then change it.
Also then filters out the 100s of older accounts that can probably die with my old email
I transitioned e-mail address twice. What has worked for me is doing it slowly. Keep the old address around: from time to time you’ll get emails from services you did not even remember being subscribed to. Also, if you don’t use a password manager, now it’s the perfect time to start. I suggest Bitwaden
Thanks. I do use bitwarden as well I selfhost a bunch of stuff like nextcloud. I’m actually weirded out on myself that I’m still depending from google
I’m thinking about this every once in a while. What about using a custom domain and a relay service like FireFox Relay or Addy.io? That would give you the option to move your actual email around easily, even after you lose access to it.
I just did this. I have an android phone so I will have a hard time getting rid of google account but I have used clodflare to create a custom email and have setup forwarding/sending vianalias inside gmail. I made a separatr address for website registrations and personal mail. I will slowly start the transitioning of all my accounts.
Never had gmail, I used my ancient hotmail to signup for a google account.
You’re using a password manager right? Just iterate through the entries in your password manager updating.
Can vouch for this method, I did something similar and just updated my email on services in order of my entries in password manager.
The email I use for random website sign-up’s is an ancient hotmail account that I only check when I’m expecting a specific email. It’s like thousands of spam messages.
The more important things using my actual email are comparatively small.
Look into the temp mail browser add-on.
Yes I do. Although many sites simply wont let you change it. I will still have to try and change as many as I can
Could you give me an example of a mainstream website that doesn’t let you update your email?
I think it might be difficult if you used oauth to create the account. In most cases your account will just continue to be tied to that oauth provider.
Sites that allow signup with oauth almost always have an option to change to traditional login with username/password
You can create a new account with email, yes. Transferring to another oauth provider or to classic email login is not something you can easily do.
It’s been years since I used stubhub but that is one site that didn’t allow me to change it out. I lost access to that email but it’s irrelevant now anyways since I charged back them on their COVID shenanigans, I’m sure that account is blocked now.
Ryanair and wizzair websites won’t let you change email
Most websites don’t let you change the email? Just create a new account then.
You have to make some sacrifices to get away from having your entire identity online tied to Google. Be willing to have some downsides to get upsides.
Currently in transition. I have about 300ish accounts to change the email handles but i set myself a goal of at least 10 a day, more if I feel like it. Its a journey not a race take your time. In the mean time though you should be backing up anything important off of your account if you havent already like contacts, photos, files and messages. That should help with your nerves, at least it did with me.
Some e-mail providers (like Proton for example) allow you to import your e-mails and contacts from gmail - that’s a start. You probably have all your passwords saved in browser/manager so you will know where to go to update them - unfortunately I don’t think there’s an automated way to do it, but it probably seems like more hassle than it actually is. I’d also search your mailbox for keywords like “welcome” or “account” to see if there are any other services you forgot you signed up for and haven’t saved the password in browser/manager.
After all is migrated and updated, you would probably want to delete your google account but I wouldn’t do that right away, just to give yourself some extra time in case you forgot about something. Log out of all google services and stop using them. Set a reminder for 1 year from now to delete the account.
I have my Gmail since beta invites so over 20 years. I’m dying with that account it’s basically my Internet SSN at this point. It’s also my real name so it’s professional n shit. The idea of moving it would be a disaster.
This is a fight you need to have. I know is an inconvenience but small steps like buy a domain and start using with new services or people is a way to start
I have this idea to buy a .su domain and host my own email addy. I’m sure all the tools to do so exist on Linux but I haven’t taken the time to really research it yet.
I’m more afraid of what would happen if I loose mine. You cannot even contact google for help. I’m not owning my email. You are not owning your email.
I frequently encounter people asking about moving from Gmail but I never understand, please help me understand if I’m wrong. Doesn’t Gmail still let you forward emails to a 3rd party address? In which case just sign up for another email service and you’re done. Email is a standard, not a service. I’ve changed email addresses probably about as many times as years I’ve been alive, it’s probably the least likely service I could think of that you could be tied in to. Am I missing something huge here?
Multiple concerns: it will only forward emails as long as the acvount is alive. Google recently annoinced it will close accounts that are inactive for certain time so if you stop using it and just use it for forwarding you are risking to lose the mail. As well there is the privacy concern that google reads every email of yours and by forwarding you are not really solving that concern
Well yes, you move the accounts across to your new provider when you come across them or sign up for new ones (I presumed the problem was that you had so many accounts that you’d forgotten them, and for some reason you needed some legacy information from them). If a few inactive accounts die then no big deal surely, you sign up for new ones?
Yes; this.
I personally went with Proton Mail which even has an easy way to import your existing Gmail emails into your new Proton Mail account so they’re still all in one place.
what email client do you use? I bought a domain with the exact same goal in mind, but I’m kinda new to self hosting / homelabs stuff and everywhere I look makes self hosting email seem extremely complicated
I use my own domain email but then I use POP3 into Gmail so I can use their interface. I haven’t found an interface or software I like more yet.
Self hosting an email server paints a giant target on your back for hackers. It’s a huge pain in the ass to keep it secure.
You have to accept that privacy costs money because your data isn’t being sold. For $5+ a month you can use proton Mail or tutanota. For ~$2 a month you can use Zoho mail or Titan mail.
Whatever you choose, it will be worth it.
Speaking from experience, I’d recommend not choosing protonmail because it is very difficult to cleanly stop paying and leave - forwarding mail to another address is a paid feature. It’s also not very standards compliant (no IMAP/SMTP support without running a buggy bridge). Their security features are mostly useless and better security can be achieved on standards-compliant services if you try.
If you set up a domain with Protonmail, you can have unlimited email addresses for that domain, although they all go to the same inbox that way. I like to use a website’s name as the user when I sign up with a website, so it’s like officedepot@mydomain.com. If I start getting emails to that address from somebody other than Office Depot, I know those rat-bastards sold me out.
With Proton Pass it will even generate those fake emails for you. No need to tweak any settings. And the best part is that you’re not forced to use the password manager that goes with it.
Consider getting your own domain. That way you own your own name, but you can swap email providers behind the scenes
I’m been in this process for the last two months (because there are so many sites to change my e-mail address). I went with Gmail originally so I did not have to change my address everytime I changed ISPs.
So my first step was to use my own domain name so that as long as i keep renewing that annually (it’s a small cost) then I keep my e-mail address (even if I change actual e-mail providers).
Next was to find an e-mail service I could point my domain to. I also needed one where I could download my e-mail to my desktop computer for archiving and reference, eg. I’m using BetterBird, but ThunderBird is another option.
So finding a mail provider is interesting as most that let you use your own domain name (custom domain name) are not free. One option was paying a small fee to by actual domain provider and use their service. I went though for ProtonMail in the end as I was already paying for their VPN service, so the difference to upgrade to the “everything” account was not that much more and scored me 500GB of online storage too (I pay separately for Bitwarden password management, otherwise that would be another plus). This allowed me to use my custom domain name (unlimited addresses), download mail through their bridge, etc.
So the real challenge really was finding a suitable mail service. I can switch easily in the future as I just point my domain name to the new mail provider, and never have to update my mail address at any sites again, and all mail is always available on my desktop computer.
I set up amazon workmail with my custom domain. Cost is $4 a month for 50GB inbox.
You can make as many aliases as you want for the same inbox.
provider is interesting as most that let you use your own domain name (custom domain name) are not free. One option was paying a small fee to by actual domain provider and use their service. I went though for ProtonMail in the end as I was already paying for their VPN service, so the difference to upgrade to the “everything” account was not that much more and scored me 500GB of online storage too (I pay separately for Bitwarden password management, otherwise that would be another plus). This allowed me to use my custom domain name (unlimited addresses), download mail through their bridge, etc.
So the real challenge really was finding a suitable mail service. I can switch easily in the future as I just point my domain name to the new mail provider, and never have to update my mail address at any sites again, and all mail is always available on my desktop computer.
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