After game designer and author Jane McGonigal sent her Pixel 5a to Google for repair, someone allegedly took and hacked her device. This is at least the second report in as many weeks from someone claiming they sent a Google phone in for repair, only to have it used to leak their private data and photographs. McGonigal
posted a detailed account of the situation on Twitter on Saturday and advised other users not to send their phones in for repair with the company.
In October, McGonigal sent her broken phone to an official Pixel repair center in Texas. She tweeted later that Google said it never received the phone, and during the ensuing weeks, she was charged for a replacement device.
But according to McGonigal, FedEx tracking information shows the device arrived at the facility weeks ago. Late Friday night — a few hours after she says she finally received a refund for the device — someone seems to have used the “missing” phone to clear two-factor authentication checks and log in to several of her accounts, including her Dropbox, Gmail, and Google Drive.
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