Step 1: Check the ‘Last Account Activity’ Section of your inbox

Often neglected, displayed in small font the ‘Last Account Activity’ section lies at the bottom of your Gmail inbox. It witnesses who uses your Gmail account and when. Click on ‘details’.

Step 2: See who has accessed your Gmail account recently

Now, here you’ll find a descriptive table, which will include-

a. The type of access which may be through browser, mobile, POP3 etc.
b. The location from where your account was accessed i.e. the IP address.
c. The time/Date of access

Step 3: Get to know more about the IP addresses that you see

Do you see IP addresses from different countries? If yes, ask yourself if you have been using any 3rd party services which are likely to use your Gmail account because these will certainly be shown in the log. DomainTools is a great site to identify any IP address. This will let you know whether there is really something to worry about or whether what you see is just normal activity.

Step 4: Keep a check on Google Alerts

Google itself keeps a keen eye on your activities and acts as a good monitor. If it finds any activity which is suspicious it will immediately alert you. Whenever such an event occurs, Google advises you to change your password, and that’s what you should do.

Step 5: Sign out all other sessions

It happens at times, that we login from a public computer and then forget to sign out. If you are worried that your account may be hacked due to a similar situation then the first thing you must do is ‘sign out all other sessions’. Though, this is not a remedy for hacked Gmail accounts, yet it can resolve any silly mistakes.

Step 6: Taking action if the account is found to be hacked

First and foremost, and very obvious- Change your password. Now the next thing is to change your security question as soon as possible. Keep some points in mind while choosing the question-

- Make sure that only you know the answer to the question and that no one can easily answer it by doing some easy research. Ex- You must avoid questions like- your mother’s maiden name, your pet’s name, your phone number, or your school etc.

- The question should not be associated with your password in any way.

- When you are in a quest to find the most difficult question for anyone else to answer, please be sure that at least you can recall the answer when needed. Some people even prefer to use complete sentences for better security, but take care to remember your answer.

That’s all that you need to understand the activity log of your Gmail account and to keep a check on any invasions. Hope this helps you to keep the hackers away!

Gmail on ipad

Gmail being the most popular mail client, is all ready for its debut on Apple iPad. Now checking your gmail in a jiffy on 9.7 inch ipad is now easy. This launch of gmail – ipad version can make you think whether these two giants are still on the cold war!

Basically, gmail’s new interface which is of course two pane is quite attractive. On the left side, the emails are listed and has conversations. And on the right pane the messages are displayed. May be this reminds you of the old version of Microsoft outlook. All the main features of Gmail Web application have been incorporated in this ipad version too.

This is not the final version of gmail for ipad, as google will keep on updating the feature list in future too. This will be done as and when more and more tablets make their way in the market.

The new interface of gamil is available now in US English only. The gmail can always be accessed through native mail application using IMAP also.