
Google is lying to get your phone number - Flavius
<i>Verify it&#x27;s you</i><p><i>This device isn&#x27;t recognized. For your security, Google wants to make sure it&#x27;s really you.</i><p><i>Enter a phone number to get a text message with a verification code.</i><p>At this point whoever got my email and password can just enter a random phone number and get instant access to my email account.<p>But don&#x27;t worry, nobody knows my email and password, this is just a dirty tactic employed by Google to get more information about you.<p>Right now I have to chose between giving them my phone number or being locked out of my email account.
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Spoom
Did you have 2FA on this account already?

If not, they're basically just forcing you into 2FA, and the easiest way to
get most people on 2FA is via text message. They're not going to tell everyone
to go download Google Authenticator. I don't blame them for wanting everyone
on 2FA, especially for an email provider. There are a million ways your
password could be stolen, and they'd rather that their system was secure from
the start rather than dealing with the fallout of an account takeover. You
should be able to go into your account settings and remove the phone number
after you enable another 2FA method.

If you are on 2FA already, that is strange.

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mattbgates
That's why you should use a virtual number... protect your real phone number
and your privacy. Here's a web app I released a few months ago that was made
for dealing things like this.
[https://textmeprivate.com](https://textmeprivate.com)

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mattmanser
This seems like damned if they do, damned if they don't.

I'm personally extremely pro-privacy, but on the other hand realise my gmail
account secures loads of my other services and so needs a phone number for
verification.

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Flavius
I'm not saying that they shouldn't ask for you phone number in certain
scenarios, but this is not one of those scenarios.

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brudgers
It might be one of those scenarios based on a pattern of behavior that Google
is in a position to identify and an individual user is not because the
patterns include temporal, spatial, network, etc. elements that emerge at the
scale of many users and across multiple web properties.

I'd put it this way, if Google wants your phone number it can just Google
it...or rather, Google already has your phone number and a whole lot more
because its ordinary data and information leaks everywhere across the web.
Trivially, all it takes is for anyone who has ever had your phone number to
have shared their address book online and odds are Google has your name and
number.

I'm not saying this is good (or bad). Just that it is. In the moment by
moment, a person can kind of avoid some tracking because the speed, volume,
and economics at which advertising is auctioned limits the depth of historical
search on a moment by moment basis. But when it comes to a specific ordinary
fact, Google has it already.

The fraud detection could in theory be triggered by something as obscure as
the angle of your phone and its acceleration parameters being unusual.

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muzani
I was extremely hesitant to give Google my phone number, then I realized
Google has access to everything on my phone. It's just a formality.

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megous
Not for everyone. I don't use smartphone, and have no google on my dumbphone.

And this practice of locking you out or give a number is annoying as fuck.
Why? Sometimes companies don't accept just any number. I have perfectly
regular number from a "virtual operator", with SIM and all that. It gets
rejected for being "unsupported."

I will surely not go and buy new SIM I have no need for, just to get access to
some stupid service, with uncertain result anyway. What are they thinking?

