As promised, I publicly said both on my Facebook and my twitter account that I was going to reveal to everyone and most especially bloggers how I lost access to my Google Adsense account for almost a month.
Without missing words, My Google Adsense account was hijacked by the owner of scholarshipgist. It was really not easy; it was traumatic as if I was in semi- hell, as at that period of crisis.
I had to call many known pro bloggers, but all their solution modus operandi proved abortive. So what I did was to start sending Google messages regarding my hijacked Google Adsense account. But I kept receiving negative replies.
Let me start clearly from how and when it happened. On the 11th of may, 2016 approximately 5:30pm Nigerian time, I received a text message from Google informing me that my password has been changed successfully. While I was on my way from school.It did not occur to me that the account was linked with my Google Adsense until when I got home, why? Because I had three Gmail accounts.
So I took a warm bath and opted for a fuel and powered my generator because there was no light. Immediately I tried login into my account, I received a response that my password was changed two hours ago, instantly I tried gaining access into my account by clicking on the forgot password section and I was prompted to insert my last password which I remembered. I did that successfully and I was granted access to my account after answering certain questions like when last did I had access to the account, rough estimate of when it was created etc..While I was busy jubilating that I had successfully taken control of my account, I was immediately logged out again. I was like, what sort of thing is this, how is this so-called hacker able to get my new password.
Furthermore, I was left almost unconscious because I taught that was the end of the road, because all my blogs, my advertising accounts, important documents, files and relevant identifications was attached to that mail account. So I concluded that it was my end-point of blogging. I immediately, I had to put a call to Mazino oyolokigho of Mazinoweb, he advice me to send relevant information’s to Google and for me to change my Google account. All that didn’t work.
On the 9th of May, I decided to search for a way to reclaim my Google Adsense account back, so I stumbled into Jide post on someone Hijacked YourAdsense Account? Here is How To Report to Google. So I send the relevant documents and claims to Google but kept receiving this email response from Google below:
I kept uploading and forwarding relevant documents to Google but the result was reciprocally abortive. So I said to myself, it is not really going to work; let me create another Adsense account and start all over. When I tried creating a new account, I discovered that it wasn’t going to be easy so I paused and kept looking for a means of retrieving my account. It was so painful, because all the information sent to Google, here is the reply you will get;
It got to a point where I had to integrate abusive words in one of my mails to one of the Google staff replying my emails, because it actually seems, they don’t even look at the content and the detailed information it carried before replying me with their negatively coated mails. Seriously bloggers reading this as I write from my heart, you won’t know what you currently have until you lost control or access to your account for two days and you decide to put a call or mail through to Google. So many times i practically blamed myself for exposing my Gmail account which contained my Adsense to the public; it should have been kept secret.
I almost held my brains in my hands when I met one of my long lasting friend who advised me to keep contacting Google insisting that in no distance time they will come to their senses. I laughed and looked at him angrily, in my mind ”this guy doesn’t know what I have passed through in the hands of Google”
On the 6th of June, 2016 angrily I bought a data plan from Glo and decided to update my Facebook profile. After the update on my Facebook , i decided to give my Gmail account a trial login.
The next day, I login into my account and sent a mail to Google directly from my account and also through
https://support.google.com/adsense/contact/cant_log_in?hl=en&rd=3
And behold the next day, I received a mail from Google which reads as follows
It seems your account has experienced unauthorized access, please provide the following information for your account to be returned (1) Proof of last payment (2) Valid identification showing your postal address (3) Bank statement showing your postal address……….
If two of the above is provided your account will be returned, and for the main time, a temporal hold on payment has been placed on your account.
Believe me I was the happiest man on earth. I know you won’t believe, but seriously I was. Do you know what happened? This hijacker tried all possible means to get to the threshold (i.e. $100) before 21st but he was unlucky.
Five days later after the investigation was successful, an invitation was sent to my email :
So this was how I reclaimed my Google Adsense account successfully, when I login into my account, all my information had been deleted and replaced with the hijackers’ info…such as his website (scholarshipgist.com) and remove most of my performing ads channel. He also changed my payee name to his “ I have actually forgotten his name because I was filled with happiness, but he was actually from the igbos region” Behold the account was in the tune of $150 and he was expecting to receive my had earn earnings in the month of June. Among other information, I had to change the bank account payee profile name and number because payment on the account was still on hold. I was strictly instructed to make these changes before contacting Google team to remove the payment holding issues.
Luckily the next morning, all payment holding issues was removed, and all Glory was given to God.
My Advice
It was not as easy as you think, I almost quite blogging because currently Adsense is one of the major earning streams for bloggers, although other earning avenue abound. I did made a great mistake by exposing my Gmail account which is related to Adsense to my blog readers and potential scammers/hackers who are using blogging to disguise themselves.
But I did learn lot of lesson, because during this process, I discovered that two step Google verification doesn’t work for Nigerian users, so I decided to craft a means of activating the two step verification to ensure maximum protection for my account , and I strongly advise that all bloggers do the same to avoid this sort of incident. Happy reading and if you are touched and inspired by this post kindly share it to fellow bloggers in order for us all to fight hackers because united we all stand and divided we will all fall, I love you all.
