Imagine running a business that depends on cloud services, only to have your account suspended three times in six months, each time for mysterious "policy violations" that nobody can explain. That's what happened to Andrew Ayer, founder of SSLMate, whose kafkaesque battle with Google Cloud reveals the risks of relying on tech giants that can wipe out your business with a single automated decision.
Ayer's company uses Google Cloud primarily to help customers manage SSL certificates by creating service accounts that access Cloud DNS and Cloud Domains on their behalf, a setup he developed following Google's own documentation.
The suspensions created a cycle of confusion. When Google first restricted his account in May 2024, Ayer was unable to access the information Google support needed to resolve the issue because the suspension prevented him from logging in. After partial restoration, Google suspended the account again for a different reason, then restored it without explanation. As reported in The Register, "I was never told why our account was suspended or what could be done to prevent it from happening again," Ayer wrote.
The pattern repeated in late October and again last Friday, when Google cited a terms-of-service violation before completely suspending access. Oddly, one customer integration continued working throughout all suspensions, even though it used the same suspended project as the others.
Ayer now plans to abandon Google Cloud for production workloads. "Clearly, I cannot rely on having a Google account for production use cases," he concluded.
Previously:
• Exec who oversaw Google's failed babykiller projects and cozied up to Saudis quits after employee uprising
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