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Gmail 2FA causes the homeless to permanently lose access 3 times a year

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Re: Gmail 2FA causes the homeless to permanently lose access 3 times a year

#11

Post by dgan »

b112 wrote: post #2

Google has a lot of issues, but the gist of these twitter posts, is that homeless people lose their phones multiple times a year, and their phone number, and this makes 2fa hard. But, I mean, why are they not railing on the phone companies, to make it easy for the homeless to keep the same phone number?! Why is this Google's fault?

but nobody ever advertised phone numbers to be assigned "for life".

People lose their phones all the times, I personally lost countless phones, and I am very far from being homeless.

The problem is forcing 2FA on everyone

Re: Gmail 2FA causes the homeless to permanently lose access 3 times a year

#12

Post by Taek »

virtualritz wrote: post #10

Won't using e.g. Authy with Gmail for 2FA alleviate the need for a phone number after the initial setup (i.e. requiring a number only once, to initially enable 2FA)? https://authy.com/guides/googleandgmail/

Yes, but that's a highly technical solution. I've been trying to get my girlfriend to use Authy for 6 months now, and the solution we landed on is that my Authy app has all of her 2FA codes, and she just calls me if she needs one.

To you and me 2FA doesn't seem that complicated. But to less technical people it's just overwhelming and they don't want to bother with the learning curve.

Re: Gmail 2FA causes the homeless to permanently lose access 3 times a year

#13

Post by Semaphor »

bertman wrote: post #9
Semaphor wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not just the homeless, there was a post on HN from a librarian talking about the same issues for the elderly and socially disadvantaged. The issue is that Google forces 2FA on them, even if they otherwise don’t have a phone.

Yep,that's what I thought of as well. Discussion from two months ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32304320

Wow, my sense of time is horrible. I thought it was about 1-2 years ago :D

Re: Gmail 2FA causes the homeless to permanently lose access 3 times a year

#14

Post by P5fRxh5kUvp2th »

I don't think access to email is the biggest concern the homeless have.

It sucks, but there are alternatives besides gmail and if google is going to spend time on this, I'd rather they not and instead spend time on getting homeless into homes.

Re: Gmail 2FA causes the homeless to permanently lose access 3 times a year

#15

Post by IIAOPSW »

Bakary wrote: post #3

I can definitely understand not realizing that you could lose access to your account if you lose your phone number. But once it happens the first time, could you not pick any free email that does not require 2FA, and warn fellow homeless to avoid gmail? I disagree with the idea that because a very, very niche audience is in dire straits that the design decisions should be based on their needs. The forced 2FA system h…

The phone number decision is stupid. I up and jump countries every few years. Each time, I'm switching to a new number. I'm the opposite of homeless, I'm that jet set elite. The idea that you want, need, should or will tie your identity to a phone number where people can always reach you is long outdated.

Re: Gmail 2FA causes the homeless to permanently lose access 3 times a year

#17

Post by [deleted] »

b112 wrote: post #2

Google has a lot of issues, but the gist of these twitter posts, is that homeless people lose their phones multiple times a year, and their phone number, and this makes 2fa hard. But, I mean, why are they not railing on the phone companies, to make it easy for the homeless to keep the same phone number?! Why is this Google's fault?

[deleted]

Re: Gmail 2FA causes the homeless to permanently lose access 3 times a year

#18

Post by Cerium »

jakub_g wrote: post #8

In one of the later posts, the OP writes that the homeless will lose any physical thing after N weeks. So what kind of 2FA would be homeless-proof? I don't see a solution. Also, fully acknowledging Google and other bigtechs 2FA is far from ideal: The other thing is, we want at the same time Gmail to be unhackable against best hackers and state sponsored adversaries for the billions of users, including high profile di…

Maybe we don't need to meet all those requirements simultaneously. The on boarding process could try to determining if 2fa would actually benefit you or not.

Re: Gmail 2FA causes the homeless to permanently lose access 3 times a year

#19

Post by angry_octet »

This problem, and the not-my-problem responses, really highlight the self centered mindset we have encouraged. What if that homeless person was your substance-abusing sibling? A friend from school with mental health issues? We need to collectively take more responsibility for those in the worst situations.

If you've every tried to teach an old person how to use 2FA you know it's an uphill battle. Using a fingerprint reader isn't even doable for some. And we're all going to be old one day.

Practically, we need ideas like to 2FA to gain tractionas widely as possible, while realising that isn't everywhere. And some people will never use 2FA, need higher thresholds for triggering lockouts, and need alternative methods for re-establishing identity to their ID provider (google in this case). For some people that might be their local librarians or community shelter, legal aid groups, and banks.

Re: Gmail 2FA causes the homeless to permanently lose access 3 times a year

#20

Post by ZiiS »

dgan wrote: post #11
b112 wrote: post #2

Google has a lot of issues, but the gist of these twitter posts, is that homeless people lose their phones multiple times a year, and their phone number, and this makes 2fa hard. But, I mean, why are they not railing on the phone companies, to make it easy for the homeless to keep the same phone number?! Why is this Google's fault?

but nobody ever advertised phone numbers to be assigned "for life". People lose their phones all the times, I personally lost countless phones, and I am very far from being homeless. The problem is forcing 2FA on everyone

If you have a permanent address the are lots of ways to ensure you keep your phone number when you loose your phone. This is a very different problem.
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