alt Hacker News1. This is a total nightmare, the author has my deepest sympathy.
2. Last time there was a post where this happened to someone, I looked into what you can do if you're locked out of your Apple ID or Google Account.
I know people will say "just self host", but all of the self-hosting solutions are not friendly to families or non-tech people. Telling my extended family to tailscale into my server to look at family photos from vacation is a total non-starter. All of the self-hosted solutions are also just way less smooth to use than the built-in integration iCloud or Google Drive gives with devices.
That said, there are straightforward options to deal with this (at least the data part), if you plan ahead. The high level strategy is to setup backups that let you get _a copy_ of your data not tied to any login you don't control. It's a bummer to have to go through these hoops, but again pragmatically, I'm stuck using these services to participate in modern life.
For Google Drive, you can rclone your data to a computer of your choice to get a copy of your data not tied to Google Account. It will even convert G-Suite files to Microsoft Office format, so you have a copy of the data offline.
For Google Photos, I'm not aware of a great way to get the data - rclone only gets low quality copies of photos. I'm an Apple user, so I didn't dive too deep here, perhaps the HN hivemind knows.
For iCloud and Apple Photos, you have a lot of options. You can use Parachute backup or the PhotoSync App to get a copy of your data not tied to your Apple ID. If you have a mac, you can also setup your mac to download everything offline, and do time machine backups - they are not tied to your Apple ID.
I will also add Synology NASes have a super, super easy to setup way to do all of this stuff (HyperBackup plus Synology Photos app) that's borderline worth the cost of admission on it's own, even with Synology's recent turn to the dark side. If you have non-technical family, you should strongly consider pointing them in this direction, if you can use a smartphone you can probably get this working.
> All of the self-hosted solutions are also just way less smooth to use than the built-in integration iCloud or Google Drive gives with devices.
The built-in integrations (iCloud, Google Drive) are smooth right up until you’re locked out or forced into changes you can't control. Obviously.
There is a middle ground though: managed service providers (per-service). You don't have to self-host everything in your basement, and you don't have to hand your entire digital life to Google or Apple either.