You lose your entire Google account if you lose your 2FA device or number (assuming it's a phone number), for any reason. Even if your Google account is set up with a non-Google email address which you still have access to, and you still know the correct password. And there's nobody you can reach at Google about it, no appeals process, nothing.
Gmail 2FA causes the homeless to permanently lose access 3 times a year
181–190 of 770 posts
Re: Gmail 2FA causes the homeless to permanently lose access 3 times a year
#182This 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…
This is missing the forest for the trees. Of course we'd be more emotionally involved if it was someone we knew, that's not hypocritical. Most people aren't against fixing societal problems, either. As it stands, homelessness is definitely something that affects a ton of people so it definitely is our problem as long as we are city dwellers. The problem here is that misapplied empathy can lead to terrible decisions.…
> Actually giving homes to the homeless would probably be cheaper than whatever we are doing now, even taking into account the mental illness and drug-abuse problems that factor into this.
This point is worth reiterating. Homelessness can be solved by providing housing. Yes, homelessness is a complex multi-faceted problem, but the first order solution to the problem is to provide housing.
Homelessness is a problem with huge externalities to society. Put another way, homelessness is an enormously expensive solution to the problem of providing space for humans to live.
Re: Gmail 2FA causes the homeless to permanently lose access 3 times a year
#183I 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…
Wtf Calling homelessness a "niche" .. peak apres moi le deluge
This is the sort of performative response that is the problem. Let's say we force Google to switch off 2FA. Now we have exposed millions of people who don't know any better to phishing attempts and financial loss. And the group we are trying to help isn't really better off. There are so many other questions we could be asking. Why are they directed towards picking Gmail by default? Why is the system to give a replacement phone every 12 weeks instead of investing in a dedicated device that's much harder to damage or lose? Why is keeping the same number a hassle? Why are we tackling the problem with caseworkers instead of something more ambitious, that would ironically be less costly in the long run? There are so many angles we could go for, but instead we are stuck on this performative nonsense that gets retweets. It's pseudo-empathy at best, because it's not oriented towards a real solution.
Re: Gmail 2FA causes the homeless to permanently lose access 3 times a year
#184Every single American should be able to get a free, permanent email account through our Postal Service!
We shouldn't have to rely on Gmail for what may be the only way to get information/apply for on basic government services!
Re: Gmail 2FA causes the homeless to permanently lose access 3 times a year
#185Earlier quoted context omitted.
> ... 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. How about the homeless person remembers a good password, and that's all that's needed for authentication? You know, just like it used to be. What exactly is wrong with that?
How do you remember a complex password? By practice? On what device? I’m sure those involved have bigger things to worry about/remember than a complex password to email. I don’t think that is the solution. I also don’t know what is. Public services that somehow provide safe access to email etc?
I always recommend a easy to remember sentence as a password.
with spaces, punctuation, some sort of capilatiozation scheme (cap every last letter, or every other ,etc) and throw a number in there.
lot easier to remember than 32 random bits.
purposely misspelling something, adding spaces, and your own cap scheme make it a secure password.
Re: Gmail 2FA causes the homeless to permanently lose access 3 times a year
#186Earlier quoted context omitted.
> They hadn’t started collecting social security due to some debts and was worried it would ALL be garnished. Your contractor’s actions makes a some twisted sense to me as he’s still receiving ‘undisclosed’ cash. The homeless veteran doesn’t make any sense to me as he was not receiving the social security funds at all.
If I told you that you had a bunch of forms to fill out, and after doing all the work you'd get no money (and it would all go to your hated ex-wife or something), you might not bother doing it.
The above example was someone who FEARED all of their money would be garnished. Not someone who was TOLD all of the money would be garnished.
That isn't the same thing.
Re: Gmail 2FA causes the homeless to permanently lose access 3 times a year
#187Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is missing the forest for the trees. Of course we'd be more emotionally involved if it was someone we knew, that's not hypocritical. Most people aren't against fixing societal problems, either. As it stands, homelessness is definitely something that affects a ton of people so it definitely is our problem as long as we are city dwellers. The problem here is that misapplied empathy can lead to terrible decisions.…
homelessness is definitely something that affects a ton of people so it definitely is our problem as long as we are city dwellers. We have to break out of the stereotype that homelessness is a city problem. It isn't. Far from it. Homelessness is more obvious in cities because there are fewer places for homeless people to be. But there are plenty of homeless people camped out in rural and suburban towns, if you know w…
What I mean is that it's almost impossible not to be affected if you are a city-dweller, it's a lot harder to ignore. Most will ignore it, but still acknowledge it as a problem for them. Even in a cynical and dehumanizing way.
Re: Gmail 2FA causes the homeless to permanently lose access 3 times a year
#188The biggest fallacy we have right now use that all use cases need to be treated equally and if they don’t then somehow they are being immoral. Google is not being immoral. The homeless people can use a different service. Dealing with the use case of someone losing their phone every few weeks when you have billions of others to worry about is unreasonable. I think handling that situation should be considered out of sc…
Perhaps not immoral but kafkaesque or something - if a government support service requires an email address to be used, and the government doesn't provide the email address, there is a dependency on the market to provide such.
And if they don't give a list of "workable free email providers" then the government has failed.
Imagine the howling if you had to have an email address to vote.
Re: Gmail 2FA causes the homeless to permanently lose access 3 times a year
#189In 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…
> ... 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. How about the homeless person remembers a good password, and that's all that's needed for authentication? You know, just like it used to be. What exactly is wrong with that?
The average person cannot remember a good password without some help, be it using it everywhere, writing it down, or using a password manager. Homeless individuals, on average, have many more stressors in life, much higher rates of traumatic brain injury, and a number of other factors that make their ability to remember good passwords much worse than the average person. Given this solution doesn't work for the average person, it will have even less success applied to the homeless.
Re: Gmail 2FA causes the homeless to permanently lose access 3 times a year
#190Earlier quoted context omitted.
My dad helps people navigate the system to find housing. Recent story was a 65yo + veteran living in a shelter. They hadn’t started collecting social security due to some debts and was worried it would ALL be garnished. After explaining that veterans get expedited in line for housing and that they would still get almost all of their SS, they have applied for it and should be housed soon. It doesn’t surprise me at all…
> They hadn’t started collecting social security due to some debts and was worried it would ALL be garnished. Is this common? I knew a guy who had the same mindset. I ended up paying him in cash for some work, he was convinced that if he made any money in a traditional role it would be instantly garnished.
In many cases I think it has more to do with having to jump through a bunch of hoops with no assurance of what the outcome will be.
Another person needed an ID. In order to apply for the ID they needed a birth certificate. In order to apply for it they had to fill out the application, mail it with money, and then have a permanent place to have the birth certificate mailed an unknown amount of time later. At which point they then needed to apply for the ID and go through that process.