Account / Blog Recovery, With Team Blogs, Requires Well Managed Membership

We've known for a while, about account recovery for team blogs.

We've sent login instructions for the blog at http://mybloggerblog.blogspot.com/ to you and the other blog authors.

Apparently, team ownership recovery has its limits.

I used "Forgot?", and got the advice

Your blog has too many authors to email them all. Please enter your email address into the form below to look up your account information.

The blog has too many contributors. Since some of these contributors' accounts are no longer active, there's no way for me to easily identify the account which has now has the administrator rights.

Like account recovery for a blog with inactive team members, the "Forgot?" wizard won't work well with large membership lists, which are not well maintained.

In this case, the would be owner (former owner?) now has two possibilities.

1. If he was the only administrator, the blog now has no administrators - and any author can now claim ownership of the blog, by using “Forgot?” and providing the proper email address.
2. If the blog still has administrators, the former owner now has to identify an administrator who is active and accessible, and who is willing to restore his account to administrator status.

What to do, now?

Once again, we see the advantage of keeping the membership list well maintained.

>> Top

Team Blog Ownership, And Abuse Classification

We see some people, posting in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken, who have problems with blogs under team ownership, and abuse classification.

My blog was deleted as spam but I don't spam! BTW, one of the other administrators of my blog recently had his Google account blocked.

We've observed, a few times, that team blog relationships create interesting complications, with various Blogger issues - and this appears to represent yet one more complication.

In most cases, when a Blogger account or blog is deleted or locked, the owner of the account or blogs affected should see an online notification, and / or receive email informing of the action taken.

There are several reasons why notification - email or online - may not always be provided.

• Blogger accounts, based on bogus or inactive email addresses, will not provide email notification.
• A person who uses multiple Blogger accounts, accidentally or intentionally, will only see the dashboard for the account currently logged in.
• An owner of a Blogger account, recently unlocked after detected suspicious / unusual activity, will see only an empty dashboard, when logging in.

The team blog ownership relationship appears to provide one more reason for lack of notification.

• Administrators of blogs under team ownership may not see notification, when one of the team members has a Blogger account deleted or locked.

Both Blogger accounts deleted for non repentant abusive activity, and Blogger accounts locked when suspicious / unusual activity is detected, appear to present this complication, with blogs under team ownership.

When a Blogger account is deleted after the owner repeatedly produces TOS violations, all blogs owned by the account are apparently deleted. It's possible that, when a blog is deleted, team ownership issues are overlooked in the blog deletion process - and the blog simply disappears from the dashboards of the other team members. It's also possible that this is a predictable group action - comparable to affiliate network detection.

When a Blogger account is locked after suspicious / unusual activity is detected, all owned blogs simply disappear from the dashboard of the owner. Blogs owned by a locked account are under automatic security review, with no appeal by the owner being possible. Team administrators are unlikely to have any alternative appeal opportunity, for a blog under review when an owning account is locked.

The latter two scenarios represent two reasons why, if we see the complaint in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken

My blog has disappeared from my dashboard, and is not online!

One initial question should be

Was the blog under team ownership?

>> Top

Team Blogs, And Confusion About Blogs Locked After Detected Account Hacking

We've been discussing deleted blogs, resulting from Blogger accounts locked after suspicious account activity is detected, for some time.

Recently, we've seen a variant on the account lock / deleted blogs problem.

I made one of my friends an admin for my blog. When Blogger deleted His Blogger account and his blogs, they deleted my blog also.

Here, we see the possibility of detected hacking, affecting other members in a team blog ownership.

If someone sets up a blog, then invites his friends to be administrators, everybody on the team becomes equal owners. This can also happen when one person maintains two or more Blogger accounts - whether accidentally or intentionally.

That's the definition of a team blog - and it's one known problem with team blogs. This case shows us another problem with team blogs.

If somebody on the team has a Blogger account locked for detected hacking, all blogs owned by that account are taken offline, for security checking. Any blogs owned by that account are going to simply disappear from the dashboards of all owners - because all owners produce the same security risk, to any owned blogs.

When a Blogger account is locked, review of blogs owned by the account starts after the account is unlocked. If the team member with the locked Blogger account doesn't get the account unlocked, the blogs owned can't be reviewed.

Once again, we see why it's a good idea to only have active team members, as blog owners.

>> Top

Abuse Reporting Is Not For Deleting A Blog For Which You Lost Control

Sometimes, people lose control of their blog, with no ability to regain control - and simply want the blog deleted.

How do I have Blogger delete the blog, for me, since I can't prove ownership?

When advised that Blogger does not delete blogs on behalf of former owners, the next thought by the former owner is to have the blog deleted as abuse.

What category of Abuse should I use, to have a previously owned blog, deleted?

While not genuinely fraudulent, the latter approach is misuse of the Abuse reporting process.

The Abuse Reporting process is properly used to report blogs owned by another party, for TOS Violations.

Blogger currently provides the Blogger Help: Report abuse form, which has specific categories of abuse.

• Legal issues
• Hate speech, violent or crude content
• Harassment
• Spam, phishing, or malware
• Nudity
• Posting of private information
• Impersonation

All of those categories refer to content published by another person. Nothing there is for reporting a blog previously owned, with control lost by negligence.

Whatever the loss of control, it's yours to correct.

• Corporate blog, control lost.
• Personal blog, control lost.
• Team blog, control stolen.

None of these scenarios warrant abuse / TOS violation reports.

Note a very specific warning, about misuse of the DMCA Violation complaint.

Please note that you will be liable for damages (including costs and attorneys' fees) if you materially misrepresent that a product or activity is infringing your copyrights. Indeed, in a recent case (please see http://www.onlinepolicy.org/action/legpolicy/opg_v_diebold/ for more information), a company that sent an infringement notification seeking removal of online materials that were protected by the fair use doctrine was ordered to pay such costs and attorneys fees. The company agreed to pay over $100,000. Accordingly, if you are not sure whether material available online infringes your copyright, we suggest that you first contact an attorney.

If your company publishes a blog, you are responsible for retaining control of the blog, as with any corporate asset. If you lose control of a corporate asset, you don't contact the vendor, and demand that they delete the asset that you lost. Your problem is with the current owner - whether it's a civil or criminal issue, it's not the responsibility of the vendor to correct an ownership problem.

If the blog was personally yours, and you forgot the account name and / or password, it's your responsibility to regain control.

If the blog was under team ownership, and another team member stole the blog, your problem is with the former team member. If the team member was (righteously or spuriously) classified as a non repentant spammer, you may have to get the blog reviewed, to regain control.

If you believe that you can prove your right to control (or delete) the blog, you may hire a lawyer, and have a judge certify your identity. None of these cases can be resolved, using abuse / TOS violation reporting.

>> Top

Google+ Circles Is Replacing Following / Google Friend Connect

Those of you who have been Following this blog, in the past, may have recently noted a new gadget in the sidebar.

Just below the "Follow Me" gadget, you'll see "+Follow Me". The latter gadget looks the same as the former, but has some subtle differences. Some differences are visible, others not so visible. And some differences are not visible to the eye - but will still affect your access to this blog.

The Google+ Circles gadget, which on this blog is labeled "+Follow Me", appears similar to the Following / Google Friend Connect "Follow Me" gadget - but appearances can be very misleading.

The larger pictures are one obvious difference - but that's not the most significant difference. Some difference need to be discussed now, rather than later, for maximum benefit.

Following / Google Friend Connect lets your acquaintances Follow a single blog. I have several blogs, and a different group of Followers for each blog. The Google+ Circles gadget shows everybody in all of your publicly visible circles, merged together. The merged concept may, or may not, be to your liking.

With Following / Google Friend Connect, your Followers can use email, or any number of newsfeed clients, to read the complete content of your blog - including each complete post, if you setup the blog feed that way. Google+ Circle members can read a snippet of any blog post intentionally Shared, in their stream - but will have to click on the link to the blog, in the snippet, to read the entire blog post. If you have read this far, that's what you have already done.

Following / Google Friend Connect works best for public blogs - and supports a reader audience of unlimited size. A Google+ Circle, likewise, supports a reader audience of unlimited size.

With a properly setup Google+ Circle, and a Blogger blog with a list of designated readers - and your readers properly accepting the emailed membership invitation, up to 99 of your designated readers can Follow your blog. As before, the limit for private blog distribution, as for any team blog, is still 99 members.

Anybody Following a blog, using the stream of any author of the blog, will see a snippet of each post Shared in their stream. To read the complete post, they will have to click on the link in the snippet. With a private blog, the reader will have to be a blog member, to read the complete post.

Many publicly visible Blogger blogs have Following communities which vastly exceed my 4700 member population (my "Follow Me" gadget, as of April 2013) - and the possibility of losing those communities will not be willingly accepted by everybody. The integration of Following with the newsfeed subscription - and with the dashboard Reading List - is not automatic with Google+ Circles.

A blog with multiple authors (aka "team blog") will have either a Google+ Circles gadget for only one author - or multiple Circles gadgets, to fairly let people subscribe to the various authors Google+ streams. Neither solution will be exactly equal to the Following / GFC blog feed subscription - especially if the various team members are similar to me, and my range of interests.

Right now, it appears that a blog can have just one Circles gadget. How team membership blogs will use Google+ is another question to ask.

Similar to the team blog, we may wish to consider the multiple interests of each blog owner. I am one person, with a number of interests. People who have intentionally subscribed to the newsfeed from this blog, and are specifically interested in my blog about Blogger blogs, may not be extremely interested in my blog about cooking - nor in my blog about jokes, pranks, and miscellaneous ramblings. Unfortunately, if you Follow my Google+ stream, you'll get a bit of each subject.

Again, the Google+ Circles gadget appears to contain the total Followers for one person, for all interests of that one person. I have not yet found a tool that will allow me to analyse the interests of each of my Followers, and to accurately determine the specific areas of overlapping, between my own personal interests and theirs. It will be impossible for many blog owners to keep an accurate Circle complement, and segregate each circle according to interest, so they may Share only relevant material with the specific members of each different Circle.

As the Google+ Circles gadget evolves, some significant improvements - and some compromises - will be required. Like the Internet, Blogger, and Google, are constantly evolving. This may require compromises by many Blogger blog owners.

We now have a rollup discussion, where each blog owner is asked to provide their thoughts about the above described issues - and possibly, others that concern you. Anybody who experienced the Blogger GUI upgrade of several years ago may, from experience, realise how much better off we may all be, with these issues discussed now - rather than later.

>> Top

Blogger Accounts, And Domains Based On Google Apps

We've know, for a while, of the downsides of having a Blogger account that's based on an email address that's provided by a Google Apps based domain. Some people are unknowingly using email that is based on Google Apps administered service - and they are not even the administrators.

A few would be blog owners - or members (of a private or team blog) - are using Google Apps administered domains for their email. This detail never becomes relevant to them, until they try to join or setup a Blogger blog.

When I click on the invite link, and try to set up a new Google account, I get the message.

Blogger has not been enabled by the administrator of the domain xxxxxxx.edu.

What do I do, now?

When you are a prospective blog member or owner, and you are using a domain that you control and own - and are able to access the Google Apps administrator account for the domain - you may be able to enable the Blogger service, for the domain. If you are merely one user of the domain, where your email service is hosted, the situation won't be that simple.

If someone else controls the email domain, where you need to use Blogger, you have 2 choices.

• Convince the domain administrators to enable the Blogger service, in their domain.
• Setup a web based email account, outside your current service.
  • Recover control of the blog, using the current email address.
  • Transfer control of the blog, to a new Blogger account.

Neither solution is ideal.

Not all domain administrators, even for those domains which use GMail services for non "gmail.com" email addresses, believe Blogger blogs to be an essential service. Some believe blog publication to be a frivolous or insecure activity, and will intentionally block use of Blogger in their domains - possibly mandated by a Corporate Security Policy. These administrators are unlikely to attend to your need with any amount of urgency.

Some educational institutions or corporations, which are now using GMail in their private domains, may also consider use of non domain, or web based, email as suspicious activity. This may also present a challenge to you, when you need to use Blogger.

You'll have to make a personal decision, when you are faced with an email account that does not permit Blogger accounts. Just understand the possible reasons why the choice is necessary.

>> Top

A Team Blog With No Administrators Is Given To The Authors, For Their Control

We have known, for a while, that every Blogger blog has to have at least one administrator.

That rule is enforced by the Permissions wizard, which gives any administrator the choice to demote or remove any administrator, from the Permissions list - but only when there is at least one other administrator in the list.

When the Permissions list is displayed, if there are at least two members with administrative authority, each administrator entry, in the list, has a link to demote or remove that member. If there is only one member with administrative authority, there is no such link - and that member can be neither demoted or removed from the list.

As long as only the Permissions wizard is used, to demote or remove administrators, this article would be meaningless (see the above link). But, there is another way for administrators to be removed - and this occasionally leaves blogs with no administrator.

If the only way to lose an administrator (or member) from a blog was by using the Permissions list to demote or remove, then the Permissions list setup, as described above, would be sufficient.

Unfortunately, the Blogger - and Google - account deletion processes don't consider the member lists for the blogs owned by the account. When a Blogger account is deleted, the fate of the blogs owned, by that account, has to be decided later.

Any blogs which have only one member (the owner) are either frozen or deleted - as with only one owner, there is no need to keep those blogs. Any blogs with more than one member simply lose that one member. But what if a blog has more than one member, but only one administrator - and that one administrator takes a hike?

With a team blog with one administrator, and one or more authors, losing the one administrator would leave a blog that was being published (by the authors), but could not be managed (because there was no administrator). This would, in the past, lead to panic in the forum.

The administrator for my blog deleted his Blogger account - and now my blog has no administrator! What do we do now?

With no administrator existing, Blogger Support would be summoned, and would have to determine whether a blog:

• Had no administrators.
• Had at least one author.
• Was being requested by a person who had a legitimate need to request control (a former administrator, or a current author).

Failure to ensure that each condition was being properly met could, with the right problem report, allow a hijacker to improperly assume control of someone's blog - with only Blogger Support to blame for enabling the hijacking.

To allow control recovery without needless delay, and avoid the need for endless detail in verifying any such panicky report, Blogger Engineering made a simple procedural change. The "Forgot your username or password?" wizard, when control recovery is requested for a blog with no administrator, simply sends the appropriate access tokens (aka "login instructions") to all blog authors - as long as the membership list is well maintained.

Any blog authors, able to receive the login instructions, then become de facto administrators - and can jointly determine the fate of the blog. The control recovery process can be automated, and the risk of possible hijacking of actively owned (administered) blogs is reduced. This simply requires that at least one blog author uses a Blogger account based on an active and genuine email address - and if necessary, can search persistently for the email sent.

When this reset process is done, each author of the blog initially has the same power as each of the other authors. Blogger leaves it to all authors to act honourably - and to politely choose one or more authors to be administrators. As long as the author submitting the reset process is able to locate the email message in his Inbox immediately, he can make himself the sole administrator - if he decides.

If one of the authors has problem locating the email, it's possible that the other newly appointed administrators could unwisely hijack control of the blog. If this happens, it will be up to the authors to jointly establish order. Blogger Support will not be involved in any conflict.

The more authors a given blog may have, the greater the chance that one author, receiving the email message, may act dishonourably, and hijack the blog. In cases where there are a large number of authors (precise number not known, right now), Blogger will defer to the author requesting the reset.

In this case, the author requesting the account reset can enter his email address, that is used by his Blogger account, to have the password reset email sent directly to him.

>> Top