Inactive Xbox Live Gamertag

I have been a loyal Xbox Live subscriber for a decade, give or take. For the past 8 or so years, I have had the same Gamertag all the way back on the original Xbox. Before my current Gamertag, I had a different one. The older account has been inactive and
not logged into in at least 7 or 8 years. I want to change my current tag's title to what I had on the previous tag, but it is still in MS's system so it says it's taken. I never even used the account on the 360, only on the original Xbox. When I made the
account from my Original Xbox's dashboard way back when, you weren't required to give accurate information, and me being an immature 15 year old, probably put bogus info into the account so I could just start playing. I've tried every email address I can think
of, so it is probably just a fake one.

I have been wanting to change it ever since the feature to change your Gamertag was added, and have checked to see if it has been deleted from the system every two or three months. Anyway, I recently "followed" the account from my current account to see
if maybe it has been reset recently and someone is using it, but it still isn't in use. It has a 9 year veteran badge with 0 gamerscore, and no avatar created. So it's obviously not in use.

I am aware that there was a "purge" of sorts a while back, where several inactive Gamertags were erased from the system; however, to my knowledge, this was only on inactive accounts with 7 characters or more. The Gamertag that I want to be reset has 5 characters,
which is why it wasn't erased.

I also understand that sometimes Xbox Gamertags can be associated with other Microsoft accounts, and if those other associated MS accounts are logged into it will make the Xbox Gamertag continue to be active. The account in question should not be associated
with any other MS service, so this should not be causing it to continue to be active.

If someone could look up this account and see that it is obviously inactive and delete it, I would greatly appreciate it.

:)

 

Do you think Microsoft will clear out old unused gamertags?

They actually do this but its not live gamertags as much as Microsoft accounts goes inactive for x period they will purge it

 

Next-Gen Xbox to Make Old Gamertags Available?

What if you could get that old gamertag that's been inactive for years or never used? What if Microsoft allowed us to use the old gamertags or names that have never been used on Xbox with the next-generation Xbox? Some names haven't been used because they are used on other Microsoft LIVE services such as Zune.

I think it would be awesome if they had a specific time frame that inactive accounts would become available again after going silver. Say 6 months after its been silver/inactive, make it available to the public again. And you could keep track of how many times its been transferred owners like they have the numbers now for how many years you've been on Xbox LIVE.

 

Unfortunately there's no way to find out exactly why an account was not purged. Gamertags with any length of characters were released as well, so not having 7 or more characters would not have kept it from being released. They did release gamertags in waves
though, and eventually stopped releasing tags because people were getting the original tags and trying to sell them. So it could just be that they stopped releasing tags before they got to yours.

 

So, does that mean it will never be used by anyone?

 

Hi Pritt08,

There really isn't a way to know if MS will release more GamerTags and until Microsoft makes some announcement no one would be able to answer that question. Based on what happened last time, they may never do it again. If you cannot gain access to the account
to just start using the gamertag, then ultimately you'll just have to pick another gamertag or keep your current one.

 

I've been told different things by different Microsoft reps. One rep told me that there is an automated system that deletes accounts that haven't been accessed in 7-10 years. If this is true, then my old account should be out of the system soon. Can anyone
confirm that Microsoft does indeed remove accounts after that time period?

 

Hello Pritt08,

Thanks for the support message.

The agent that informed of that is correct, but there are NO guarantee's that the Gamertag will be available in that time frame. The account is deleted if it is not used in about 7 years but we can't really rely on that.

Should you have any other concerns, feel free to post back.

Cheers!

 

Is there anyone who I can talk to who has the power to delete accounts, and will be able to look up this account information and see that this account is obviously not in use and delete it for me?

If this could be done, I would be extremely grateful. I would even be willing to pay a higher fee than the typical $10 USD or whatever is it to change your Gamertag.

 

Support would be the only ones who have access to accounts, but they will most likely give you the same information you've already been given.

 

If accounts are routinely deleted after they haven't been used in 7 years, this one should have been already deleted at least one or two years ago. It is still in the system, and I've been checking it almost every day for years. If it is Microsoft policy
that the account will be deleted after approximately 7 years of inactivity, why is there "NO guarantee's that the Gamertag will be available in that time frame" and why can't we "really rely on that", as iNb4 Ownage put it? It doesn't make sense.

 

The 7 year timeframe has never been 100% proven as fact. I've seen a lot of people mention that support has told them that, but never seen any information to support that claim. From what I understand, once a gamertag is on the servers, it's there for good
unless you change the tag to something else or Microsoft releases them. The only time Microsoft has ever announced that they were releasing gamertags was when they purged the original Xbox tags.

 

www.ign.com/.../ask-microsoft-anything-about-xbox-one

In this article, Microsoft teases that they may be releasing inactive Gamertags. Is it just false hope?

"Will you be releasing old, inactive Gamertags for use on the Xbox One?

WHITTEN: We’ve released inactive gamertags in the past, but it’s been a while. Stay tuned."

The article is admittedly old, but it is from after they released inactive Gamertags the first time.

 

Since they use the tag system for more than just the console, it's hard to say if/when they might release tags again. Originally it was easier because they just released tags that had only been used on the Xbox and had never carried over to anything else.

 

They also ran into a lot of issues with people just getting the released tags and trying to sell them. So that may be another issue that's keeping them from releasing more.