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I don't think it's possible to make a Google account without a phone number anymore. It's really unfortunate, especially because I deliberately don't set up fal
by x1798DE 10y ago
I don't think it's possible to make a Google account without a phone number anymore. It's really unfortunate, especially because I deliberately don't set up fallback contacts for my "alternate" gmail accounts, and Google keeps locking them as suspicious when I log in from a second location, and I need to "verify" with a phone number any time that happens (at which point I abandon the account).
I understand that they want to fight spam, but I'd be willing to spend 5 minutes doing captcha type activities in exchange for not requiring a phone number, and that should pretty severely rate limit account creation.
- fullmetaleng 10y agoWhen is the last time you tried? I have created a gmail account couple of weeks back without providing phone number and recovery email.
- eveningcoffee 10y agoI did it. Then they banned it. Having my phone number or any other hard identifier is none of Googles business.
- tacomonstrous 10y agoI did it recently, and burned myself, because I forgot my password and had no way of recovering the account. As far as I know, my account isn't banned, though.
- Chris2048 10y agoI moved country, and had to wait to visit the country I registered in to get the account back.
- dimino 10y agoThey didn't ban your account for not having a phone number.
- eveningcoffee 10y agoWhat else? I was creating this for Youtube videos for my son. When we were about to upload a video, it was already banned.
- dimino 10y agoI dunno, but you weren't banned for not having a phone number attached to your account, because I and many others have accounts without phone numbers and are not banned.
- eveningcoffee 10y agoIt may depend on the time frame and geolocation. I tried to do this about 6 months ago. I have also an old account that does not have a phone number and it is functional. What I was describing was a creation of a new account.
- dimino 10y agoI'm not Google customer support, but I'll repeat for a third time; you were not suspended because you didn't provide a phone number.
- lucb1e 10y agoI think you've made your opinion clear. Why continue to try pushing it as fact? There are a thousand factors at play in spam/fraud/whatever detection, how can you possibly say with a straight face that you're certain the phone number is not a leading reason?
- eveningcoffee 10y agoIt may be that this persons knows something more that we do not (does not seem to be the case) or has very different experience. I do not mind this. It is indeed possible that the cause of the ban originated from some other source as from entered personal details and sequence of actions. It actually motivates me to create another experiment. While this statement will be really buried, it reminds me that we still should be thankful that we can somewhat conceal our identity as a private enterprise can be much more unforgiving that the state.
- givinguflac 10y agoI have a google account without a phone number, but it's always been that way so they probably aren't going to ban me... I hope at least until I finish migrating
- clarry 10y agoThey could lock you out of your account and require your number before letting you log in again. Any day. Happened to me.
- baybal2 10y agoThey do that if: 1. You don't log in from a first world IP (the terminology from their user operations team), but previous logins were from them. 2. You registered from an IP in a country where they don't have access to sending SMS, but they go to a country where they have. 3. Bot detection algo flagged you, and bot detection algo are one of their crown jewels that they don't tell to support people.
- jcsvyu789jh 10y agoDo you disagree with their right to specify the terms of use as to include a phone number, or do you just not like the rule?
- eveningcoffee 10y agoI think that giving such agencies the power to identify unique individuals is not beneficial for the humankind.
- codedokode 10y agoIt probably depends on your IP address, country and maybe something else. Some time ago I was unable to register on youtube without providing a phone number, and earlier I have registered a Google Account from Android emulator that was instantly blocked. Maybe it is because of spam, or maybe because lot of people are using the same IP address.
- vonklaus 10y agoI think the main issue is that google doesn't accept certain senders anymore. As a generic thread about running a mailserver/mail service pops up here often. That means users are shoveled into about one of 4 "acceptable" providers which have control of the entire market. They demand, full name and usually gender, mobile, alternative email and more. So you get pushed into their information pipeline to stop "spam".
- cmdrfred 10y agoIt accepts my personal mail server just fine. You need to support encryption, spf, and dkim but mail will flow no problem to gmail users in my experience.
- rsync 10y agoNot mine, FWIW. Ten out of ten score on mail-tester.com, a clean IP that I acquired 15 years ago ... and further, gmail watches people daily remove my one-to-one correspondence from their spam folders. And yet, most (but not all) new gmail recipients will not see my emails until they remove them from their spam folder. Google does not want people to self-provide email and there is no incentive for them to do so.
- twr 10y agodnsbl.info reports that 69.43.165.11, MX for mail.rsync.net, is blacklisted by ips.backscatterer.org: http://www.backscatterer.org/?ip=69.43.165.11 http://www.backscatterer.org/?ip=69.43.165.11 I suggest fixing your SMTP server configuration [1][2] and maybe listing your IP on dnswl.org. (edit: I see you did the latter.) [1]: http://www.backscatterer.org/index.php?target=bounces http://www.backscatterer.org/index.php?target=bounces [2]: https://web.archive.org/web/20140215064312/http://spamlinks.net/prevent-secure-backscatter.htm https://web.archive.org/web/20140215064312/http://spamlinks....
- rsync 10y agoThat's the rsync.net mailserver and that's interesting, thank you. However I was speaking of my own, personal mailserver, which is not listed. Also - do we really think "big email" (like google) are using either of these (blacklist or whitelist) services ?
- jasonjayr 10y agoI've several children, and can no longer make Google accounts for their Chromebooks. All the phone numbers I have and control can no longer be used to register further accounts. What happens to users that buy a new Android cell phone who's number has been burned by Google?
- antocv 10y agoThis is the time to get to know https://mail.yandex.com https://mail.yandex.com Seriously, the interface is so much better than todays gmail, its astonishing. There is no spam either, and no ads.
- jasonjayr 10y agoThe email account is not the issue; I run my own email server with all the fun that brings. It's that the Chrome Books really need separate Google accounts otherwise, settings + notifications to end up replicated to all of them. And yes, I have a greater than average number of children. I feel as if the only way forward is to purchase a google for business account, and add them all there :-/
- ensignavenger 10y agoInstall a different Linux distro on them?
- IsmaOlvey 10y agoAnyone have any experiences with their support?
- givinguflac 10y agoIronically you could create google voice numbers as a workaround
- mfkp 10y agoIIRC Google doesn't allow using Google Voice numbers for account verification (or other known VOIP number blocks).
- djsumdog 10y agoI never put in my number into my Google account. Ironically, the only US number I have is via Google voice/hangouts. So they have it. It's just not associated. I'm not even sure if it would be allowed, as there'd be no way to use it as a 2-factor auth without actually being logged in.
- throwanem 10y agoI recently tried doing exactly that, and got back something like "This is not an acceptable verification number" with no further explanation.
- 5555624 10y agoI created one on Monday, without a phone number. I did provide a (@outlook.com) recovery email. I did not try to create a Google Voice number for it though and I think that does require a phone number.