First things first: if you got a confusing email from GSuite that says something like “[Action Required] Remove internal links to the G Suite Domain Contact page for your organization” don’t panic!

Bottom line up top: They’re just recommending that you clean up any old links to an out-of-date service that you probably weren’t aware of and almost certainly never used.

The rest of this post is a more detailed explanation, a little more reassurance, what to look for (just in case), where to look, and… a little more reassurance.

Details

If you use Google’s GSuite for Business for email you may have gotten confusing email from them. Here’s what the email says and I’ll tell you what to do about it

Subject: [Action Required] Remove internal links to the G Suite Domain Contact page for your organization

Dear G Suite Administrator,

You are receiving this email because users within your organization may have active links within their documents, websites, scripts, or applications that go to Google’s G Suite Domain Contact page. On August 31, 2020, the Domain Contact page will be removed, since it contains the Admin contact details of Google’s customers. If your users don’t remove internal links to this page in their resources, the links will break as of August 31, 2020, resulting in a “404 Error” code.

What do I need to do?

Instruct your users to remove the following Domain Contact page link within your organization’s internal documents, websites, scripts, or applications: www.google.com/a/<domain-name>/DomainContact.

You will need to provide your users with the <domain-name> for your organization and send them the following step-by-step instructions:

• To remove the Domain Contact link, follow the steps below:
  • Step 1: Open your internal documents, websites, scripts, or applications.
  • Step 2: Search for any links that reference www.google.com/a/<domain-name> with your domain name filled in for <domain-name>.
  • Step 3: Look for links that contain DomainContact.
  • Step 4: Remove each link.
  • Step 5: Replace the link with a tested, live link to a document or website.
  • Step 6: Save your document, website, script, or application.

What if I don’t do anything?

Google is not providing a redirection link for the G Suite Domain Contact page. This may cause a 404 “Page Not Found” error when your internal users attempt to use documents, websites, scripts or applications that rely on the link.

Your domain-names(s) listed below are affected:

• Domain: your-domain-here.com

How can I get help?

If you have additional questions or need assistance, please contact G Suite support. When you call or submit your support case, reference issue number 151080983.

Thanks for choosing G Suite.

—The G Suite Team

What to do if you think maybe you ever did link to Google’s “Domain Contact” service page?

Well. First of all if you did have a link you probably know it! Or more accurately, if you did have a link your company’s probably big enough that you have an IT specialist and they know about it.

What to look for

But just to be sure, as the directions say, to search your site for links that look like

https://google.com/a/your-domain-here.com/DomainContact

Then remove those links

Places to look:

• Your “contact us” page
• Other pages for or about current clients or current employees
• Other pages (unlikely)
• Blog posts (unlikely)
• “Social” links at the top or bottom of every page (possible)
• Other links at the bottom of your page (possible)
• In sidebar widgets (slightly more possible if your site is so old it still has sidebars!)

While you’re at it

• Remove any Google+ links you find, because Google+ is also obsolete

But really, don’t worry. As I said all the way at the top, the folks at GSuite just recommending that you clean up any old links to an out-of-date service that you probably weren’t aware of and almost certainly never used.