"Your account information was entered incorrectly" during a MacBook reset

I was resetting my MacBook, and Erase Assistant asked me to sign out of Find My first. The email it showed was an old address I had removed from my Apple Account a while back. I typed every password I could think of, and every one ended the same way: “Your account information was entered incorrectly.”

The fix

I added that old email address back to my Apple Account, and the Mac detected it right away. The reset went through.

Apple Accounts can carry several email addresses, and any of them can sign in (About your Apple Account email addresses). Mine was still holding the old one, so until that address was part of the account again, no password worked.

If you cannot add the email back

There is another way: remove the Mac from Find My at icloud.com/find (select the Mac, then Remove This Device). That turns off Activation Lock, and the erase can go ahead. Apple explains it in How to remove Activation Lock.

Either way, check before you remove an email from your Apple Account: if a device still points at it, your next reset will ask you for a password that no longer signs in anywhere.

Another Apple fix I have written about: How to fix imessage not syncing.