Cannot Access My Email, Zero Support from Microsoft

Question

The Bird's Eye View

Someone tried to hack into my main email account, attempting multiple times to access it. I'm not sure if they succeeded, because I was locked out of my own account. When I attempted to log back in, I was subject to a Kafkaesque, circuitous labyrinth of a system that has left me returning to the same line of dialogue every time, no matter what I try: “Please retry after sometime or try using a different device or network.”

The rest of this convoluted garbage fire of a problem is gonna require some explaining, so without further ado:

The Details

The following is a summary of everything I have done in the last four hours, to regain access to my account:

• I received an email asking me to change my password or confirm/deny that there were multiple false attempts to log into my email. How would I know? Why is the onus on me to figure that out? I didn’t answer those emails right away, because I found them AT WORK, doing MY JOB. It is not my job to do detective work for Microsoft, when their security was compromised.
• In my defense, the emails demanding personal information looked and read like phishing scam emails, asking me out of nowhere for personal information, so that was another reason I ignored them at first**.**
• I had no idea things would spiral the way they did. When I got home at the end of the work day, I discovered I was (and still am) locked out of my main account on all my devices – PC, laptop and phone.
• I attempt to sign in by clicking “sign in," figuring I can get in, change my password and that'd suffice, as I activated 2-factor identification months ago when another attempt was made to access my account by a stranger.
• Instead of logging me in, I am shown a dialogue that looks like this:

I attempted to use all three options and none of them worked. "Face, Fingerprint, PIN or security key" opens up a dialogue that asks me for things I don't have. I don't have anything it requests, and it won't let me provide a picture or a fingerprint. I don't have "Windows Hello," or a security key, and was given no indication of how to get either of those things. This option asked me to use a phone or tablet, neither of which worked, because they simply demanded I log in - which I can't do. The QR code it offered took me to a message that said: “Please retry after sometime or try using a different device or network.” That is a blank white page with text, there is nothing I can do when I reach that page.

• I attempted a second time to use the mobile app, but when I put in my password in there I got the same message: “Please retry after sometime or try using a different device or network.”
• I attempted a second time to put in my password and got another: "Please retry after sometime or try using a different device or network.”
• Not deterred, I called the Canadian customer service line, and was greeted by a machine, and refused the option to talk to a human. I fed it the necessary answers to my questions and it refused to put me in contact with a human, insisting I visit: "aka.ms/pwr."
• I went through the "support" dialogue on the page "aka.ms/pwr" and figured the only option I hadn't tried would be to go through another email.
• So I logged into a secondary email I have through outlook, answering a gauntlet of intrusive difficult to answer questions about who I last sent emails to, what the subjects work and what my previous passwords were, all to verify my identity.
• To my relief, I got a message almost immediately to my secondary email, advising me my identity had been verified. That email even had a URL that allegedly was going to bring me to a password dialogue and restore my access.
• That did not happen, because when I clicked that link it brought me to the same page, with the same message: "Please retry after sometime or try using a different device or network.”
• I attempted again, to log in via my phone and laptop, and even booted my computer into Linux on another hard drive, to see if that would help. Each time, I got the same dialogue: "Please retry after sometime or try using a different device or network.

The Consequences

This has been extremely disruptive, as I have a lot of personal and important financial information going into that inbox. So far, I have received nothing but automated garbage replies that have done nothing to ameliorate my situation, and I have maybe a couple of weeks before I start to hit real walls in real life, without access to that email. (I.E. I'm not looking forward to when I stop being able to pay my internet bills, all of which are sent to that inbox.)

Has anyone been through this gauntlet of nonsense, and come out for the better? There is zero accountability on the part of the company, as they think a page with instructions and an answering machine will suffice. I come here because I am at my wit's end. If this cannot be resolved I have to reroute everything to another email and just forget this one.

It's kind of really wild that a billion dollar tech company is allowing accounts to be so easily compromised - even with 2-factor, which mine was - with zero recourse or accountability to those who have been victimized on account of their sloppy security protocols and almost completely absent technical support.

Answer 1

The free mail accounts from MS have no Phone or other support, all support is online

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/account-billing/how-to-recover-a-hacked-or-compromised-microsoft-account-24ca907d-bcdf-a44b-4656-47f0cd89c245

If you use a mobile device to access email its often difficult to detect what is a scam or is real, if you use a dedicated mail app, eg MS Outlook a desktop component of some MS Office suites its easy to see who the real mail sender is.

And if you have a paid for branded AV/Security these are usually auto detected