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July 29, 2011

Gmail's Auto-Forwarding Notice

Google decided to show a pink bar which informs Gmail users that their messages are automatically forwarded to another email address. The annoying "you are forwarding your email to ..." is displayed for about 3 minutes every time you open Gmail this week.


The explanation for this temporary annoyance is that some malicious software or other people who gain access to your account can setup auto-forwarding. "For about a week, this notice will appear for a few minutes each time you sign in to your account. Displaying the notification in this way helps ensure that you have a chance to see the notice, rather than someone who might try to gain unauthorized access to your account and use this setting improperly. The notice will disappear immediately if you choose to disable the forwarding setting, but that decision is up to you," mentions Google.

So that's the reason why there's no "dismiss" link and you're forced to see the pink bar again and again. Maybe it would be more useful to show this message for one week after auto-forwarding has been setup.

If you no longer want to see the message, temporarily disable auto-forwarding, switch to the simplified HTML interface or pin the Gmail tab if you use Chrome, Firefox or Opera. Another option is to add this filter in AdBlock Plus: mail.google.com##.fVKDI (the extension is available for Firefox and Chrome).

15 comments:

  1. i saw it earlier today and felt good about this. a lot of people with previously hacked gmail have no idea that their accounts is silently forwarding mails to another ID. this is good update.

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  2. Hotmail had this for months ifnot years, I always found it annoying (I use a backup account for my email so I got this always enabled). But for one week it seems good indeed.

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  3. THANK YOU THANK YOU for the Adblock-plus Filter!!!

    very much appreciated!

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  4. A little CSS will get rid of the banner (and thanks Google for becoming even more annoying with every passing day).

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  5. I can definitely see Sushubh's point, here: If someone got hacked a while ago, the solution of having the message show up for a week after a filter is created would fail to catch their attention (because the filter's likely older than a week).

    I think this is principally an effort to ferret out long-lived hacking.

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  6. I was admittedly ready to commence violent one-man street demonstrations over the annoying pink bar at the top of my otherwise pretty gmail screen; however, now that I know why it's there I can calm down and save my clever protest signs for future re-use. Note to Google: How about a little 'hi, I'm here because...' link next to such a banner in the future?

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  7. It's absurd that you won't even let people temporarily close it. It's a huge waste of space.

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  8. Anonymous. "How about a little 'hi, I'm here because...' link next to such a banner in the future?"

    Duh. "Why is this notice here?" isn't clear enough?

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  9. "About a week" has been three weeks and counting. What jackass at Google made the decision to NOT let me get rid of that message once I've reviewed it? Come on, Google.

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  10. How annoying. We should have the facility to remove it once we've accepted it

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  11. I have to say if it helps to stop hackers auto forwarding your emails then I can put up with this. A while ago someone got into my emails and autoforwarded them all my sent mail disappeeared.

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  12. I had this problem too, it would be a good way to stop hackers autoforwarding your sent mail.

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  13. Hi, I have a question about the auto forwarded incoming emails. Can I find anywhwre a log of the emails that have been forwarded to the other address in the past?
    Thanks!

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  14. We are a reputed technical support providing company to all Gmail Email customers who are facing technical concerns such as their Gmail account not working. Gmail is one of the extensively used email platforms around the world so it is not possible for Google to provide phone support to all its email customers. https://www.buzzfeed.com/jiprinojit/gmail-support-services-to-resolve-2hmtt

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    Replies
    1. LMAO - you know the difference between reputed and reputable right? Reputed indeed.

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