Miscellaneous topics that do not fit into specific categories.
Hi, Tor M. Rasmussen
Welcome to Microsoft Q&A forum.
Sorry for this unwanted experience regarding your Hotmail account getting exposed. Here is the clear path that you can follow to delete your account and keep all your data (old emails and files) intact:
1. Delete your Hotmail account
- Sign in at account.microsoft.com.
- Go to Your info > Close account.
- Follow the prompts. Microsoft gives a 60-day grace period before permanent deletion.
2. Keep your old emails and files
- Important: OneDrive and Outlook data are tied to the same Microsoft account. If you delete the account, you lose access to its cloud storage.
- Backing up to OneDrive under the same account does not make it transferable to a new account automatically.
3. Options to preserve data
- External backup (recommended): Download your files from OneDrive and export your Outlook emails/contacts to a PST file. Store them on a USB or external drive.
- Reload to new account: After creating the new account, upload files to its OneDrive and import the PST into Outlook.
4. Why this matters
- Microsoft does not allow merging or transferring OneDrive content between accounts.
- If you delete the old account, its cloud storage becomes inaccessible.
Hope this helps. Feel free to get back if you need further assistance.
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