Alexandria Felton logged on to her Hotmail account last month and was shocked to find that all of her saved files were gone.
At stake was years' worth of personal and business correspondence, photos and the itinerary for a recently purchased trip, the San Jose, Calif., health care worker said. Frantic, she called the Microsoft-run e-mail service, only to get worse news: Due to "system events," the files were gone forever, and there was nothing to be done about it, a technical support staffer eventually replied.
"It's scary," Felton said. "These services are easy and free, so people don't even think about using them. But they should know there are risks. I won't store so much stuff on Hotmail again."
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