Account Deactivated. Can't Reactivate

[Allusernamesaretaken 4]

Hi. Trying to log in, I get a message that my account has been deactivated. No reason is given, I haven't done anything wrong as far as I know, and I certainly didn't request an account deactivation. There is no link to reactivate, so I can't click or tap on that. I can't contact support as I'm not a premium customer, and I have had to use a different email address just to sign back up, so that I could post this issue on here. Of course, I need to get my old account reactivated so that I can access my many notes; just using the account with my new email address is not a solution to the problem. 

Has anyone else had this problem and managed to find a solution? Thanks to anyone who can help! 

[LauH 2]

Today when I opened my Evernote app, it said that authentication failed. I tried to log in on the web page, but it said my account had been deactivated. I tried to reactivate it, but when it asks for an email, it says that no account information is linked to that email. I made the dumb mistake of using a temporary (mailinator) email and never thought about changing it. I guess someone got my details and deactivated my account, or maybe Evernote did because of the mailinator email. Is there any way to restore my notes?

[gazumped 11,652]

4 hours ago, LauH said:

Today when I opened my Evernote app, it said that authentication failed. I tried to log in on the web page, but it said my account had been deactivated. I tried to reactivate it, but when it asks for an email, it says that no account information is linked to that email. I made the dumb mistake of using a temporary (mailinator) email and never thought about changing it. I guess someone got my details and deactivated my account, or maybe Evernote did because of the mailinator email. Is there any way to restore my notes?

If the account has been deactivated,  it can be reactivated - but you need to log in somehow. I'm afraid it was a really bad idea to use a temporary email address as a credential that you might need to re-use,  and Evernote Support are the only folks who may be able to do anything about it.  They're away for 2 days with Thanksgiving,  under a lot of pressure anyway,  and a Basic account gets last priority for support requests - so I suggest you get your request in as soon as possible,  and use another basic account (and a real email address) in the meantime.

[gazumped 11,652]

23 hours ago, Allusernamesaretaken said:

Hi. Trying to log in, I get a message that my account has been deactivated. No reason is given, I haven't done anything wrong as far as I know, and I certainly didn't request an account deactivation. There is no link to reactivate, so I can't click or tap on that. I can't contact support as I'm not a premium customer, and I have had to use a different email address just to sign back up, so that I could post this issue on here. Of course, I need to get my old account reactivated so that I can access my many notes; just using the account with my new email address is not a solution to the problem. 

Has anyone else had this problem and managed to find a solution? Thanks to anyone who can help! 

Hi.  I responded to someone else today who was in the same situation - they had used a temporary email address to log in which had (presumably) expired.  If that's not the situation here,  maybe something else is going on.  Evernote support are the only people who can take this any further,  and they are 1) away for Thanksgiving 2) pretty busy at the moment and 3) as you noted - not usually available to Basic users.  However.  Go to Evernote support - https://help.evernote.com/hc/requests/new and use the 'continue as guest' option to report your issue.  When you get a ticket number please post it back here and we'll flag it for an Admin to have a look at...

You can also try https://twitter.com/evernotehelps for assistance.

[25DIMSDALE 0]

My premium account disappeared. In its place is a new account activated this month with about ten odd notes from different years. I have a ten year premium account. Asked for support, but no response. Tried to recover data from Evernote.com to no avail. TEN YEARS WORTH OF DATA GONE! H-E-L-P

[LauH 2]

15 hours ago, gazumped said:

If the account has been deactivated,  it can be reactivated - but you need to log in somehow.

Yeah, but I think the "hacker" changed the email, since the email is no longer connected to an account it says.

Maybe the account was just closed by Evernote for breaking their terms by using a temporary email, could be.

15 hours ago, gazumped said:

Evernote Support are the only folks who may be able to do anything about it.  They're away for 2 days with Thanksgiving,  under a lot of pressure anyway,  and a Basic account gets last priority for support requests - so I suggest you get your request in as soon as possible,  and use another basic account (and a real email address) in the meantime.

Thanks, I made a support ticket, but I also understand if they're not really able/willing to help given my dumb act.

Thanks again for your help, hope I'm able to get my notes back, if not then touché 🙂

[Mayte VDV 0]

16 hours ago, gazumped said:

If the account has been deactivated,  it can be reactivated - but you need to log in somehow. I'm afraid it was a really bad idea to use a temporary email address as a credential that you might need to re-use,  and Evernote Support are the only folks who may be able to do anything about it.  They're away for 2 days with Thanksgiving,  under a lot of pressure anyway,  and a Basic account gets last priority for support requests - so I suggest you get your request in as soon as possible,  and use another basic account (and a real email address) in the meantime.

My Account also disappeared out of nothing. I can restore nothing, very disappointing... The notes I've made were very valuable. 

[Allusernamesaretaken 4]

Hi Gazumped. Thanks for the reply. I clicked on the link you provided but it wouldn't let me continue as a guest. It just kept bringing me back to the log in page whenever I clicked on continue as guest. After a couple of unsuccessful tries, I ended up having to log in to submit a ticket. In my help request, I explained that I was having to use my new email address for this but that it is my original account (with my original email address) that is the one I can't log in to. I hope they understood what I was trying to explain. Anyway, my ticket number is 3213627. If it could be flagged for the admins to look at, that would be great. Thanks for your help. 

[PinkElephant 8,076]

Just made an attempt to bump your ticket up the queue.

Remember they had thanksgiving, and now it is weekend. So probably no reaction before office hours Californian time on Monday.

[Allusernamesaretaken 4]

On 11/27/2020 at 7:06 PM, PinkElephant said:

Just made an attempt to bump your ticket up the queue.

Remember they had thanksgiving, and now it is weekend. So probably no reaction before office hours Californian time on Monday.

Yes, of course. Thank you

[LauH 2]

Thank you for your help. I just received an email saying that my account has been reactivated by Evernote support. Looking at the activity logs it doesn't look like anyone has accessed my account. Support said it was deactivated for security reasons. I've now changed the email to my actual email.

Again thank you for you help 😊

[gazumped 11,652]

On 11/26/2020 at 2:36 PM, Mayte VDV said:

I can restore nothing, very disappointing... The notes I've made were very valuable. 

See the other posts in this thread...

[Shane D. 1,818]

Hi All,

This is a known issue that has affected a small number of users.

I'll be reaching out to you directly via DM with further information.

[Allusernamesaretaken 4]

On 11/30/2020 at 6:41 PM, LauH said:

Thank you for your help. I just received an email saying that my account has been reactivated by Evernote support. Looking at the activity logs it doesn't look like anyone has accessed my account. Support said it was deactivated for security reasons. I've now changed the email to my actual email.

Again thank you for you help 😊

I have also received an email saying the same thing (deactivated for security reasons, now reactivated, etc.) But when trying to log in, nothing has changed. It still says "account deactivated" on the log in page, with no link to reactivate it. So annoying. Am about to reply to the email I received, to see if anything can be done about this. 

[gazumped 11,652]

9 hours ago, Allusernamesaretaken said:

Am about to reply to the email I received

Is that from Evernote?  I'd suggest a DM to @Shane D. (see above) if you've not already heard from him!

[Allusernamesaretaken 4]

On 12/2/2020 at 12:58 PM, gazumped said:

Is that from Evernote?  I'd suggest a DM to @Shane D. (see above) if you've not already heard from him!

Yes, it's from Evernote support. I have replied to it but will also try contacting Shane D, as you suggested, just in case. 

[gabriellobato1987BR 0]

Hello there,

I'm Gabriel, from Brazil. I having this same issue. Me and my partner in business have been using evernote since 2015, most of our working life is there.

I'm quite desperate since i just can't work without evernote. My hands are tied until the support answer our request (via e-mail) or here.

I have just sent this message to @Shane D.

"Hi Shane, my business account gabriel@***.ag was deactivated for no reason.

My whole working life is there (at least the last 5 years), and i really, REALLY do need to access it.

Can you please help me? I've just requested for help via support but the expect to help me in 10... 12 days.

I can't wait that long. Hope you can help me.

Thanks in advance,
Gabriel Lobato "

[gazumped 11,652]

9 hours ago, gabriellobato1987BR said:

I have just sent this message

Hi.  I hope Shane is able to help you.  Please edit your post though and delete your email address from here - we're a public forum and it's visible to everyone including potential spammers...

[Allusernamesaretaken 4]

Well, Oleg at Evernote support ended up having to reactivate my account for me, but as a result, I can log in now, thankfully. Thanks to the folks on here who helped. Much appreciated! Good luck to anyone still unable to access their account. 

[gazumped 11,652]

6 minutes ago, Allusernamesaretaken said:

I can log in now, thankfully.

Glad to hear it!  Happy holidays!

[Wanderling Reborn 185]

You don’t just deactivate a user account “for security reasons” without (1) informing the user (2) providing an explanation (3) providing means to contact support and reverse the action. Especially when you’re talking about a service that people store their important and often irreplaceable data in. This is... mind boggling.

[gazumped 11,652]

3 hours ago, Wanderling Reborn said:

You don’t just deactivate a user account “for security reasons” without (1) informing the user (2) providing an explanation (3) providing means to contact support and reverse the action. Especially when you’re talking about a service that people store their important and often irreplaceable data in. This is... mind boggling.

AFAIK the only deactivated accounts here were Basic users,  and there could be any number of reasons why the system decided that some 'suspicious' activity (or lack of it) merited deactivating the account.  Since the links to Support (and this forum) are public, anyone who has suffered this indignity seems to have a pretty clear route out,  and -despite the fact these are non paying users- Evernote has been supportive in getting folks back online.  Seems like sensible and reputable behaviour to me - and if you do have "important and often irreplaceable data" I do recommend not saving it into free apps.  Bad things can happen if you do...

[Wanderling Reborn 185]

4 hours ago, gazumped said:

AFAIK the only deactivated accounts here were Basic users,  and there could be any number of reasons why the system decided that some 'suspicious' activity (or lack of it) merited deactivating the account.  Since the links to Support (and this forum) are public, anyone who has suffered this indignity seems to have a pretty clear route out,  and -despite the fact these are non paying users- Evernote has been supportive in getting folks back online.  Seems like sensible and reputable behaviour to me - and if you do have "important and often irreplaceable data" I do recommend not saving it into free apps.  Bad things can happen if you do...

Whether they are paying users or not, as long as they are using the service as intended, Evernote has a responsibility to protect users' data that was entrusted to them, and provide a path to recovery if the problem was on their end. Same goes for the hundreds of millions of people using free email services from Google and Microsoft and Apple and what not. If Google tomorrow just wiped out millions of users' accounts without warning, they would be hit with class action lawsuits and government agency investigations and the fact that it's a "free service" would not help them. 

Besides, this is a question of professionalism. If a free user's account can be deactivated by mistake, and the only way to fix it is by begging for help on a users' forum and hoping that someone can alert the company, this does not instill much confidence in the internal processes or business organization. 

[PinkElephant 8,076]

The current way to unlock every account is to switch to Premium for a month, by this removing the device limit plus get access to support.

One can discuss whether this is an adequate answer to the limit. Currently it is the fastest way to fix things.

Personally I think EN should offer an „always on“ access to the accounts settings, without access to the notes if the device limits were violated. The legal aspect is something for lawyers to argue - because the device limit was always there, and does not restrict access if not violated I doubt it would be easy to prove the company is handling it wrong. If the current way to do it is good for user relations is another question.

[Wanderling Reborn 185]

On 12/20/2020 at 8:19 PM, PinkElephant said:

The current way to unlock every account is to switch to Premium for a month, by this removing the device limit plus get access to support.

One can discuss whether this is an adequate answer to the limit. Currently it is the fastest way to fix things.

Personally I think EN should offer an „always on“ access to the accounts settings, without access to the notes if the device limits were violated. The legal aspect is something for lawyers to argue - because the device limit was always there, and does not restrict access if not violated I doubt it would be easy to prove the company is handling it wrong. If the current way to do it is good for user relations is another question.

I am not sure that the bolded part is true in this case.

The problem with going Premium for a month is that the user is basically being forced to pay for support even if they were locked out via a service error.

I understand not providing support for free accounts, but there’s got to be a clear way to get hold of Evernote in emergency situations which may be due to problems on their end.

[gazumped 11,652]

18 minutes ago, Wanderling Reborn said:

there’s got to be a clear way to get hold of Evernote in emergency situations which may be due to problems on their end.

I only bolded that bit because it seems to be the new fashion.  Why are we arguing hypotheticals?  AFAIK no-one who has had an account mysteriously deactivated has commented here as to the justification or otherwise for that action.  Evernote may have detected suspicious activity on the account,  received conflicting instructions,  or the accounts may have inadvertently been deactivated by the user.  The company aren't going to comment on individual cases,  and the users don't seem bothered,  so why labour the point for so long? 

Is this about the device limitation?  If so,  please get over it.  Evernote is not a charity.  You have 365/24/7 access to their server space and free storage space,  plus (nearly) all the features of the full software.  If you find the service useful and especially if you save 'essential information' there,  either pay for it,  or use one of the competitor services that aren't (yet) charging for access.

If a user falls foul of the device limitation (and there's no indication that the OP had that problem),  the worst case is a wait to the end of the month so the device swop limitation ends.  Deactivation is something else entirely and isn't (as far as anyone knows) anything to do with problems at Evernote.

And: user data has not been lost - deactivated accounts are not accessible,  but the content is still available if/ when the account is reactivated.

[PinkElephant 8,076]

We have had other threads here with users complaining about EN to allow hackers into their account. EN did not allow it, these black hats got user login data from other breaches, and probably simply tried a number of known services for reused login data. We do know that EN may lock an account when too many login attempts did happen, to avoid brute forcing or password guessing attempts.

IMHO it is better in these cases that an account gets locked than opened by evil meaning folk.

The other cases boil down to old e-mail accounts where users did not have access any longer (but the unlock instructions were send there), lost, sold or damaged devices needed to unlock etc. That a locked account may result in being temporarily not being able to access ones notes is intentional - if there is a security issue, EN first must find out who is legitimate in his approach to the account.

We have no case reported here where data may have been permanently lost. As far as I can observe it here in the forum everybody (including Basic users) got support in critical cases.

 

[Wanderling Reborn 185]

 

8 hours ago, gazumped said:

 

Quote

I only bolded that bit because it seems to be the new fashion.  Why are we arguing hypotheticals?  AFAIK no-one who has had an account mysteriously deactivated has commented here as to the justification or otherwise for that action.  Evernote may have detected suspicious activity on the account,  received conflicting instructions,  or the accounts may have inadvertently been deactivated by the user.  The company aren't going to comment on individual cases,  and the users don't seem bothered,  so why labour the point for so long?

Per Evernote's reply, it seems pretty clear that this is a known problem on their end. So not a hypothetical. 

On 11/30/2020 at 5:19 PM, Shane D. said:

Hi All,

This is a known issue that has affected a small number of users.

I'll be reaching out to you directly via DM with further information.

 

Quote

Is this about the device limitation?  If so,  plIf you find the service useful and especially if you save 'essential information' there,  either pay for it,  or use one of the competitor services that aren't (yet) charging for access.ease get over it.  Evernote is not a charity.  You have 365/24/7 access to their server space and free storage space,  plus (nearly) all the features of the full software.  If you find the service useful and especially if you save 'essential information' there,  either pay for it,  or use one of the competitor services that aren't (yet) charging for access

This issue impacted both paying and free users.

This is not about device limitations. This is about data integrity. Device limitations and feature limitations are fine. Losing access to your data is not.

Quote

If you find the service useful and especially if you save 'essential information' there,  either pay for it,  or use one of the competitor services that aren't (yet) charging for access.

"We don't guarantee access to your data unless you pay up" is not a good message. However, I doubt that Evernote chose you as their spokesman. 

[gazumped 11,652]

7 minutes ago, Wanderling Reborn said:

We don't guarantee access to your data unless you pay up

Not what I said.  If you choose to put your data into an app,  it makes sense to become a subscriber because you

1. get access to support
2. help to ensure that the app will continue to be available - 'free' app providers tend to have a short existence
3. help to fund future development - coders like to be paid too
4. have access to a contractual relationship with the provider,  subject to the T&C document none of us read before actually using the app

If you decide to use a free app you should know that you're taking a risk.  

13 minutes ago, Wanderling Reborn said:

This is about data integrity.

No,  it's not.  The data is fine. Some users lost access to it for still unknown reasons which the users affected seem to have accepted without issue.

15 minutes ago, Wanderling Reborn said:

Losing access to your data is not

<Sigh> No-one lost access.  There was an issue.  It got fixed.

20 minutes ago, Wanderling Reborn said:

this is a known problem on their end

Possibly because there were several reports,  some of which I escalated for the users involved.

21 minutes ago, Wanderling Reborn said:

I doubt that Evernote chose you as their spokesman

Well spotted.  I'm a user, just like you.  Tired of spending my time on this discussion about an imaginary problem instead of actually being able to help other users.  I'm out.

[Sansan Cao 0]

Can I also please get help to reactivate my account?? It also got randomly deactivated. I had to make a new Evernote account using a different email to post this. If anyone can please help, please DM me for the email I am trying to reactivate. Thank you in advance.

[gazumped 11,652]

On 12/28/2020 at 10:44 PM, Sansan Cao said:

please DM me for the email I am trying to reactivate.

Hi.  Most people here are users like you.  The man to contact is @Shane D. (see post above) - hover your cursor over this green icon to message him.

On 11/30/2020 at 10:19 PM, Shane D. said:

Hi All,

This is a known issue that has affected a small number of users.

I'll be reaching out to you directly via DM with further information.

[OrbWeaver 83]

My problem is not exactly this but it is similar. I instructed Evernote to NOT renew my Premium subscriptions (I have 2) when they come due. I changed my mind about one subscription but it seems that that is not allowed. There is no place I can find in "My Account" or "Account Status" or anywhere else that would allow me to turn the renewal back on.

If they don't want my money, I can use something else. I could always just create a new account but that's a major PITA what with a few gigabytes of notes to reload.

Strange how they make it so easy to close an account but so hard to "unclose" the same account.

[gazumped 11,652]

 

14 minutes ago, OrbWeaver said:

There is no place I can find in "My Account" or "Account Status" or anywhere else that would allow me to turn the renewal back on.

The developers may have been over hasty in not allowing for u-turns in subscriptions,  but the answer would appear to be to wait until the account reverts to Basic on the renewal date,  then re-upgrade it to Premium...

In your protection,  Evernote is probably not permitted to arbitrarily reinstate payments without your specific instructions at the time.

[PinkElephant 8,076]

@OrbWeaver Once I wanted to use up my EN points, and could not find a way to do so. Support advised on it:

• Let the subscription expire (no data gets lost)
• You get reminders, and they kept the Premium status for about a week after the due date, sending more reminders.
• When it had expired, I could enter my points, get 6 month worth of Premium out of it.
• At the end, the same thing again: Let expire, go to account and renew the subscription.

Again, there is not data loss, no existing note will be truncated because Basic allows only smaller notes etc. It is just a little waiting game, and I went through it twice without ever being a day without Premium status, even though my subscription had ended twice.

[Tazmaz 0]

Someone keeps signing in under my name on Evernote.  I want to drop this service but not if someone has my info and tries to get in here as me.   So I change my password but I just want to drop the service. I don’t remember ever signing up for it

[Tazmaz 0]

Is there someone at Evernote I can talk to about my account being compromised.  I just received an email showing a guy from Pakistan signed in as Mr

[PinkElephant 8,076]

Unauthorized access:

https://help.evernote.com/hc/en-us/articles/115004395487

Maybe I misunderstand something here, but you should at least know if you have an EN account. If does not create itself, you must have created it yourself, or somebody who has access to your identity created it for you.

[tom_roger 3]

 I am having this issue with my old account that's why I am using new one. 

[PinkElephant 8,076]

You have which issue ?

This thread is a hodgepodge of "issues", most unrelated, many self inflicted.

If you want an idea, give us more facts.

[LeAnne A 0]

Hello! It sounds like I am having the same issue as the folks above. Someone took my account over and deactivated it in the past 12 hours. I have created a second account just so I could get in here to let someone know of the problem. I've already contacted EVERY Evernote social account to no avail and even contacted the new ownership company. At this point, I just need to get access to get my notes out of there. Reading back through previous comments above it looks like there is a *chance* that could happen for me. If anyone has any suggestions in this rapidly changing environment for EN I would very very very much appreciate it!

[gazumped 11,652]

On 7/12/2023 at 6:44 PM, LeAnne A said:

If anyone has any suggestions in this rapidly changing environment for EN I would very very very much appreciate it!

Hi.  Subscribers can raise support queries here - https://help.evernote.com/hc/requests/new and Free users here - https://twitter.com/evernotehelps (but it's usually easier to use the Support option in the mobile client). 

[Wakatsuki 0]

I'm facing same issue. My Evernote Account was suddenly deactivated. So I tried reactivate my account at Reactivate your account (evernote.com). I submitted my e-mail linked to that account, but it shows "Email address is not associated with an Evernote account. Would you like to create a new account?". Let me know reactivate my account. thank you.

[gazumped 11,652]

On 11/30/2023 at 3:07 PM, Wakatsuki said:

My Evernote Account was suddenly deactivated.

Hi.  "Suddenly?" - That doesn't usually happen.  Full explanation please with details of device / OS / Evernote version (if you can remember..)

[PinkElephant 8,076]

We had some reports now of accounts hacked and then deactivated and deleted. If this might have happened (was 2 FA activated ?), you need to contact support ASAP, to prevent that the account will be terminated after the waiting period.

Support as a guest:

https://help.evernote.com/hc/en-us/requests/new?ticket_form_id=254668&guest=true&guest=true