For several
years now, I have been attempting to steer clients clear of Yahoo and anything
related to Yahoo. Aside from the irritating interface of frames buried
within more frames covered in ads, Yahoo has had several security breaches over the years,
losing well over 1,600,000,000 usernames and passwords in total. At its
peak, Yahoo was once worth over one hundred billion dollars before being bought
out by Verizon for a mere 4.8 billion.
Yahoo
officially solidified its position as one of the worst protectors of user data on
Wednesday when they revealed in a press
release that data from more than one billion user accounts had been
stolen in 2013. This is separate from the
breach which occurred in September, when it was announced that 500 million
accounts had been compromised.
Having warned one of my clients for several years on his
business’s use of Yahoo email accounts, I finally received the inevitable call
when emails had been sent out from his account which he did not send. This
particular hack resulted in some pretty specific emails being sent to people on
his contacts list requesting things such as account numbers and wire transfers.
Being that it was coming from his email address, users on his contacts list
assumed the honesty and accuracy of the request and granted the hacker the
information they requested.
I am now
assisting my client in not only purchasing and setting up a proper domain name,
but an email account for the aforementioned, and moving all contacts and emails
from his Yahoo account to his new account. I have also set up a secure
forwarder so that he does not miss any emails over the next few months before completely
cutting Yahoo off.
AOL has
also been on my list of domains to avoid and it too has been the victim of several
data breaches. Its interface is more loaded than a Chinese newspaper, with so many windows, marketing ads and clickbate, just trying to check your email becomes an attack on the senses. Aside from that, its users have been on the unfortunate receiving end of such a hackneyed stereotype of being aged troglodytes for so long that it seems even AOL itself has begun to pray upon this potential vulnerability.
Upon using the website or the AOL Desktop program, the user will find several mycleanpc-esque ads that are actually from AOL. Aside from this blatant use of scare-tactics pertaining to issues which have been debunked again and again, a class action lawsuit was filed against AOL in 2012 regarding Support.com and AOL's Computer Checkup software, which used software developed by Support.com. The software was reported to often claim illegitimate problems with users' computers and would then offer to sell them software to fix the plethora of non-existent problems —for which AOL allegedly charged $4.99 a month and Support.com $29. Both AOL, Inc. and Support.com, Inc. settled on May 30, 2013 for $8.5 million.
Being that Google's top related search suggestions when researching AOL is "Does anyone still use AOL", "Do AOL email addresses still work" and "Does AOL still exist", it would become apparent pretty quickly that AOL is not exactly the top choice of email service providers. Knowing of how god-awful their service is as a whole, AOL has been known to ignore clients’ demands to cancel service and have also been known to send out reoccurring bills which clients never needed to pay before. The New York Attorney General's office began an inquiry of AOL's customer service policies, revealing that the company would actually reward employees who purported to retain subscribers. I have actually had several clients who would receive monthly small bills from AOL and never knew why. Due to the small amount and the client assuming it was something they needed in order to use their computer, they would often just pay these bills and never question it. That is, until I would come along and find that they were pretty much paying for nothing or that they didn't even use any of AOL's services anymore.
I wanted to provide a concise source of information for those who are still using these services and could never get a straight answer as to why they shouldn't. It seems like a lot of people have been told that they shouldn't use these services, but not by those armed with any useful, compelling information. "Because, I mean, just look at it!" isn't a good reason for someone to uproot from something they feel is tried and true. Further, most of these users, if not all, are under the impression that they are so invested in the service that they could never leave - that all of their contacts, emails, and future emails would be lost. Though AOL and Yahoo would really like you to continue believing that, even taking steps to make it a rather needlessly irritating process to move on - I can tell you from experience that it is not only possible, but relatively painless. For you, anyway. For me, well....That's what I get paid for.
Upon using the website or the AOL Desktop program, the user will find several mycleanpc-esque ads that are actually from AOL. Aside from this blatant use of scare-tactics pertaining to issues which have been debunked again and again, a class action lawsuit was filed against AOL in 2012 regarding Support.com and AOL's Computer Checkup software, which used software developed by Support.com. The software was reported to often claim illegitimate problems with users' computers and would then offer to sell them software to fix the plethora of non-existent problems —for which AOL allegedly charged $4.99 a month and Support.com $29. Both AOL, Inc. and Support.com, Inc. settled on May 30, 2013 for $8.5 million.
Being that Google's top related search suggestions when researching AOL is "Does anyone still use AOL", "Do AOL email addresses still work" and "Does AOL still exist", it would become apparent pretty quickly that AOL is not exactly the top choice of email service providers. Knowing of how god-awful their service is as a whole, AOL has been known to ignore clients’ demands to cancel service and have also been known to send out reoccurring bills which clients never needed to pay before. The New York Attorney General's office began an inquiry of AOL's customer service policies, revealing that the company would actually reward employees who purported to retain subscribers. I have actually had several clients who would receive monthly small bills from AOL and never knew why. Due to the small amount and the client assuming it was something they needed in order to use their computer, they would often just pay these bills and never question it. That is, until I would come along and find that they were pretty much paying for nothing or that they didn't even use any of AOL's services anymore.
I wanted to provide a concise source of information for those who are still using these services and could never get a straight answer as to why they shouldn't. It seems like a lot of people have been told that they shouldn't use these services, but not by those armed with any useful, compelling information. "Because, I mean, just look at it!" isn't a good reason for someone to uproot from something they feel is tried and true. Further, most of these users, if not all, are under the impression that they are so invested in the service that they could never leave - that all of their contacts, emails, and future emails would be lost. Though AOL and Yahoo would really like you to continue believing that, even taking steps to make it a rather needlessly irritating process to move on - I can tell you from experience that it is not only possible, but relatively painless. For you, anyway. For me, well....That's what I get paid for.
