Comment by 4cao

Funny, I've also had this happen recently to one of my accounts, only without the policy violation part: in my case, it's just that Google noticed "unusual activity."

I haven't forgotten the password, and still have access to the backup e-mail address but Google won't let me access the account regardless: it keeps asking a security question, which I believe was never set (although I can't say for sure since this account is very old, it was created when Gmail was still by invitation only).

I've mostly been using it for all kinds of membership registrations, where I don't want to enter my primary e-mail address for privacy reasons or to avoid being spammed, so it's probably not a big deal. However, the bottom line is that it's really easy to lose access to your Google account, and there's no recourse.

Edit: Tried to log in again now, and this account is only "locked," not "disabled," whatever the distinction between these two states is.

Separately, another Google account, which I had been using as my primary e-mail until a couple of years ago, is now set to forward all mail to my current address, and I noticed that whenever I log in and click the button to save the Gmail settings, even without modifying any of them, it would get disabled for suspicious activity, and I would have to recover it using the backup e-mail address -- which happens to be the same address all the mail is forwarded to. I expect it's just a matter of time before I'm locked out of this account as well, despite hardly ever using it nowadays.