Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Twitter forces all new users to enter a valid phone number

sucky.ninja

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

361–370 of 393 posts

Re: Twitter forces all new users to enter a valid phone number

#361

Post by duckqlz »

nl wrote: post #305
munk-a wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No? I'm not clear on what the real point of this question is - twitter is a terrible platform to use for actual communication. Their sorting by "relevance" can cause recent messages to get lost in the shuffle and randomly mess with your visibility. It may be you're considering twitter as a business in which to coordinate product sales, but I'll assume it's for customer relations management, many companies that have a…

I'm really just confused by the question though - these things are not the same and twitter is simply not as important as the place your money lives (and I think pretty much everyone would agree?.. I disagree pretty strongly. Twitter is much more important than the bank I keep my money in. Banking in fungible. Twitter gives me access. I've arranged meetings with the partners of the biggest VC fund in Australia sorely…

"Twitter is much more important than then bank I keep my money in" Wow, I will gladly trade you my twitter handle for your credit card number ;D

"Banking in fungible." You cannot instantly replace a bank account, transfer credit, or make changes without the help of the bank itself yet twitter can instantly be replaced by many forms of communication (SMS, Email, IRC, Talking, etc).

"I'm much more relaxed about a 2 day delay in my banking than a 2 day delay in Twitter." So if your car is on empty and you stop to buy gas only to find that your checking and credit accounts (from the bank) have a 2 day delay, you would find that acceptable!?

Re: Twitter forces all new users to enter a valid phone number

#362

Post by skinnymuch »

dragonwriter wrote: post #276
joering2 wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It won’t do. Twilio (and basically majority of other virtual number providers, except of very tiny few located in Europe) do not provide regular cell-type text messaging capabilities, but rather something PBX pros call “short codes”. No self-respecting provider out there, be it Twitter Facebook, Gmail, Yahoo, Instagram, etc. will deliver your confirmation info via a short code. so you need regular ported cell number…

> Twilio (and basically majority of other virtual number providers, except of very tiny few located in Europe) do not provide regular cell-type text messaging capabilities, but rather something PBX pros call “short codes”. Twilio provides both regular phone numbers with SMS and MMS capability and short codes, the latter primarily for high-volume outbound messaging.

Those won’t work either with most big services asking for verification. There’s subreddits dedicated to getting non VOIP phone numbers (which Twilio isn’t) for verification.

Re: Twitter forces all new users to enter a valid phone number

#363

Post by 1024core »

est31 wrote: post #120

The other component is that once they have the phone number, they can do anything with it they want, unless you leave the network. E.g. facebook once did the same, they required phone numbers "for two factor authentication". They promised to not use the numbers for anything else. A few years later they started sending SMS spam to users about what their friends did on facebook, and now facebook users can enter the num…

> Your only choice as individual user is to leave the platform.

For some platforms, even this is not an option. Case in point: LinkedIn (owned by Microsoft). I get "friend" suggestions about a friend that I know is not on LinkedIn. He's absolutely social-media averse, and would never be on LinkedIn (or FB, for that matter). But LinkedIn continues to claim that I can connect with him.

How did they get his email address? Because some third person (who emailed both of us) probably shared his contacts with LinkedIn.

Re: Twitter forces all new users to enter a valid phone number

#364

Post by baud147258 »

nemothekid wrote: post #204
syshum wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> epidemic abuse by trolls, I am soo tried of hearing this excuse for mass censorship First of it MASSIVELY over used to the point where people call anyone that disagrees with them "a troll" or a bot. Twitter is hurting their own brand by their obvious political bias and selective enforcement of rules largely dependent on outrage mobs to "report" rule violations. Like real names policies before it, these types of "v…

1. It’s very strange for someone to both claim that they never use Twitter and also claim “abuse” is an overblown excuse. Twitter is currently the model platform for large scale mob justice and harassment. 2. The “real name” policy is effective on Facebook for the type of abuse Twitter is trying to curtail. It would help if you explain why you feel the real name policy is ineffective. In any case, only Facebook (the…

Not having an account is not the same thing as not using Twitter, you can read tweets without an account

Re: Twitter forces all new users to enter a valid phone number

#365

Post by rsync »

dragonwriter wrote: post #276
joering2 wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It won’t do. Twilio (and basically majority of other virtual number providers, except of very tiny few located in Europe) do not provide regular cell-type text messaging capabilities, but rather something PBX pros call “short codes”. No self-respecting provider out there, be it Twitter Facebook, Gmail, Yahoo, Instagram, etc. will deliver your confirmation info via a short code. so you need regular ported cell number…

> Twilio (and basically majority of other virtual number providers, except of very tiny few located in Europe) do not provide regular cell-type text messaging capabilities, but rather something PBX pros call “short codes”. Twilio provides both regular phone numbers with SMS and MMS capability and short codes, the latter primarily for high-volume outbound messaging.

"Twilio provides both regular phone numbers with SMS and MMS capability and short codes, the latter primarily for high-volume outbound messaging."

Your parent is correct - you've missed each others' points.

Twilio sourced numbers cannot receive SMS from other shortcodes. No exceptions. They are not "mobile" numbers.

So yes, your twilio sourced number can send and receive SMS and you can even rent a shortcode from twilio and send/receive with that. What you cannot do is get a "normal" twilio number and receive shortcode messages.

For that reason, providing a twilio number to a provider like twitter or facebook will not work - they all typically send their auth messages via shortcode.

Re: Twitter forces all new users to enter a valid phone number

#366

Post by identity-haver »

lmm wrote: post #328
kingaillas wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Twitter is a Rorschach test - all those things you criticize Twitter for seeming to be (rage factory, shitty blog, etc.)? That would be entirely the fault of the users in those specific circumstances. The value proposition for me is receiving targeted news/information disseminated in a convenient format. As a concrete example, I'm crewing/pacing at a 100 mile trail run in two weeks, and I'm subscribed to that event's…

> The value proposition for me is receiving targeted news/information disseminated in a convenient format. As a concrete example, I'm crewing/pacing at a 100 mile trail run in two weeks, and I'm subscribed to that event's twitter feed. It's the Umstead 100 in case you are curious (@Umstead100). During the event, it will tweet out news and updates of interest to participants, volunteers, and others. > Yes, they could…

I've heard that even if you flip the "algorithmic timeline" switch off, you still don't see a linear feed of everyone you're following. It's still filtered and manipulated, just closer to linear.

Speaking of design decisions, here's a bit [1] about how the "quote tweet" encourages the behavior of "dunking", a usage I have only ever heard in regards to Twitter. Basically, if anyone with a Twitter account says something you think is stupid, you quote tweet them and "dunk" on them about how stupid it is and they are. Then everybody piles in and retweets the "dunk", perhaps adding their own riposte. And the original poster is only a click away in the quote, so you can then go to their profile and find other things to dunk on, send mean DMs, etc.

[1] https://slate.com/technology/2017/12/dunking-is-delicious-an...

Re: Twitter forces all new users to enter a valid phone number

#367

Post by rsync »

josh_carterPDX wrote: post #258
apo wrote: post #86

Linking pseudonyms from two different networks (in this case, Twitter and the phone system) together is a classic and serious privacy leak. It's far from clear exactly what information Twitter, in its longtime effort to combat spam, has already collected on its users. Throwing a phone number into the mix expands to range of activities that can be unambiguously tied to the same individual. Given that Twitter certainly…

I agree. The first thing I thought was that someone will build a script that creates a Twitter account then simply uses Twilio's API to create a valid phone number to receive verifications. Good luck Twitter!

"I agree. The first thing I thought was that someone will build a script that creates a Twitter account then simply uses Twilio's API to create a valid phone number to receive verifications."

Unfortunately, this will not work.

Twilio numbers are not "mobile" numbers and cannot receive SMS from shortcodes.

So while your twilio number can send/receive SMS just fine, it can't receive SMS from a shortcode.

As of my recent conversations with multiple Twilio engineers at Signal 2018, there are no exceptions to this rule - once a number is owned by Twilio it ceases to be a "mobile" number and networks providing shortcodes cannot send SMS to it.

In my experience, all banks/twitters/facebooks/etc. use shortcodes to send their auths/2FA/etc.

So it won't work, I'm afraid. I have heard, however, that there are some smaller twilio competitors that provide true mobile numbers but I forget the name(s) of those providers and honestly, I would be worried that those numbers would get blacklisted or filtered in some other way.

There's a reason other carriers refuse to send shortcode SMS to "non mobile" numbers ...

Re: Twitter forces all new users to enter a valid phone number

#368

Post by rsync »

sadris wrote: post #244
miguelmota wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agree with the sentiment but what better alternative do you propose to prevent abuse?

Require a deposit to sign up. If you quit you get it back. If you get banned you lose it.

This is what the discussion site metafilter does. Unlimited lifetime access for USD $5. It appears to work - very high S/N ratio there.

Re: Twitter forces all new users to enter a valid phone number

#370

Post by sadris »

gpm wrote: post #356
sadris wrote: post #341

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Landlords are allowed to place received security deposits into interest bearing accounts.

Where I live they owe interest to the tenants on deposits.

Correct. And they get that interest by placing it in an interest bearing account.
Post reply on HN