I’d just as soon delete the AOL account but I’m nervous someone else could register it and use it to get into ancient decades old stuff out there in other “leaks” on the dark web. Making it so a screen name can not be recycled by other parties (without say some kind of an account recovery code) will be an acceptable compromise too.

I don’t really use aolmail anymore and would be happy to free up whatever resources go into keeping me around but this account is so old and , probably, tied to so many other websites that could unlock all manner of personal data on me if someone else were to register it and I’ve already had some similar issues with identity theft and “doxxing” from someone reclaiming an old “expired” account from what is now yahoo mail, though I’m not sure if that’s a current yahoo policy. It’s all one and the same now. They were separate products from separate companies when that happened. Thank you.