I think I've got this thing figured out, but I won't know for sure until it happens again, if it happens again. The Google machine seems to be occasionally having trouble recognizing my computer, so it wants to send me an authentication code by text message, but I don't have texting capabilities. There are several other options, none of which work for me at the present. It looks like the easiest one for me to accommodate is the one where I establish another email account with somebody other than Google. Google calls this a "recovery email". Then they can send their authentication code to me that way. They have a record of the account I had with the Dish company, but that address doesn't work because Dish discontinued their email service some years ago, which is why I went to Google in the first place.
It was about three weeks ago that this happened the last time. Both times it lasted for two days and then went away. The messages that Google sent me after they let me back in are identical except for the name of the town where the alleged hacking attempt came from. This suggests to me that there is some kind of glitch in Google Land because a human hacker wouldn't be so consistent. Unless the alleged hacker is another computer, a renegade bot that escaped from its handlers and struck out on its own.
That other thing was your classic "your computer is infected" scam. I don't think he did any damage, but again, it may be too soon to tell. He wanted to sell me a program that was going to take 35 to 40 minutes to down load, and I think that's where the bad stuff was. I didn't allow that, and I didn't give him any money, so I should be okay.
When I can't get into my Gmail, I can't get into Blogger either because they are both Google products. I had no trouble with Wikipedia, Face Book, or my news or weather apps.
I don't think I'm even going to try to catch up with you guys, I'll just jump in somewhere as soon as things settle down around here.
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