Checking gmail without giving account access to handset?

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richms

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#261480 29-Nov-2019 20:33

I have a need to read and reply to a poorly secured shared gmail account.

If I add it in the gmail app it seems to add my device to the account in a way that anyone can locate me, erase the phone, add apps to it etc.

I just want to check the email and reply to it.

Is this possible without resorting to a 3rd party mail client and imap/smtp settings?

Richard rich.ms

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#2363168 29-Nov-2019 20:51

I am not sure what you are driving at here. If you are concerned that anyone who finds your phone can get at your email account through the Gmail app there are a number of ways you can mitigate this, and the the same issues arose with any other accounts in play.

Can you be a bit more specific about why your Gmail account is vulnerable?

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richms

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#2363174 29-Nov-2019 21:22

I am concerned about other people using the gmail account being able to remote wipe, track my phone, install apps etc, and since they are using stupid passwords the fact that its possible that it could be used somewhere else and be easily guessable.

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lxsw20

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#2363195 29-Nov-2019 22:56

Could you not use the web browser on the phone?

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#2363199 29-Nov-2019 23:48

Could you use the guest access in andriod for this?

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Hiamie

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#2363330 30-Nov-2019 09:29

I think you can set up Gmail to automatically forward from the shared account, or be collected by another email account. (I could be wrong... It wouldn't be the first time I was wrong, and it most certainly wont be the last!)

If so, just create a new personal Gmail account, and have the shared account emails forwarded to that, or have have the new account collect emails from the shared account.

richms

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#2363378 30-Nov-2019 11:20

lxsw20:

Could you not use the web browser on the phone?

It wont notify on new mails that way. I guess I could do the fowarding thing to see I had emails and then log into it so the reply comes from the right place.

This whole giving the account access to my phone thing just to check emails seems to be a huge oversight and will probably mean that the next time we need email services, it will be from outlook.com instead. Didnt think of this as a problem when setting this up.

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lxsw20

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#2363396 30-Nov-2019 12:21

Sounds like it's a GSuite account, rather than a GMail account and has MDM enabled. Thats the only way I can think you would be able to delete anything from your phone. If it's the GSuite MDM, it can't track your location.

imap won't be able to do any MDM functions either, but it's possible imap is disabled forcing you to use GMail app or activesync.

richms

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#2363398 30-Nov-2019 12:24

Its just an @gmail.com address set up to organize an event, but it seems the gmail app on the phones add a mailbox is tied to the phones add a google account so it ends up with all that access when logged into the google account on the web thru find my device and the play store.

Richard rich.ms

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#2363482 30-Nov-2019 15:14

You should be able to prevent this issue by having setup your Android phone with with your own "permanent" email address. Then it doesn't matter so much what other email accounts you access. I have multiple gmail email accounts and multiple non-gmail email accounts which I use on Android without problems. They are not explicitly linked to the phone features because the phone has it's own account.

You don't have to use the gmail app. All the Android phones that I've used default to a generic email app that is not the gmail app.

Anyway, as suggested above, the better solution is to use your web browser to access insecure email accounts so there are no assumptions made about the security of the email account.