4 ms·

Twitter is an anonymous comment section on steroids. How about some kind of real user verification beyond email addresses? (i.e. Phone verification) It could be

Twitter is an anonymous comment section on steroids. How about some kind of real user verification beyond email addresses? (i.e. Phone verification) It could be an optional step, but then provide the ability to ignore any Twitter content that doesn't come from these more-verified accounts?

rsoto 10y ago
As stated previously, there's no easy answer. Even when validating a telephone number, then everyone would use Twilio to create multiple "validated" accounts.
- pavel_lishin 10y ago
  And individuals with a valid need for multiple twitter accounts would find it difficult to validate them.
- brandon272 10y ago
  Using Twilio to get around the verification may be obvious if you are a HN reader, but most people have no idea what Twilio is. Phone verification is certainly not a bulletproof solution, but I have to feel it would help a lot. And it doesn't have to stop at phone, either. You could multiple levels of verification, like Airbnb. Then as a user you could further filter how strict you want your tweet exposure to be.
  - dictum 10y ago
    > Using Twilio to get around the verification may be obvious if you are a HN reader, but most people have no idea what Twilio is 4chan isn't a bunch of computer illiterate folks, either.
    - brandon272 10y ago
      Yep. Phone verification certainly isn't bulletproof. But reducing the deluge of abusive posts by troll accounts featuring Pepe memes as their profile image even 10 or 20% would be tremendous, in my view.
- fnord123 10y ago
  Every hurdle helps. Like OpenBSD `pledge`. It doesn't stop everything and processes like bash can fork/exec to unwrap the pledge wrapper. But it helps get in the way of return oriented programming. Theo de Raadt had a good description of why every hurdle helps, but I can't find it. :(
harveywi 10y ago
This is actually a really good idea, as it would ensure that there is a citizen behind each Twitter account. Currently this lack of control hinders implementation of more effective systems for combating online abuse such as a social credit score system.
matt4077 10y ago
I'm pretty sure they're using phone verification, although it may differ depending on location and client device.

rsoto 10y ago

As stated previously, there's no easy answer. Even when validating a telephone number, then everyone would use Twilio to create multiple "validated" accounts.

pavel_lishin 10y ago
And individuals with a valid need for multiple twitter accounts would find it difficult to validate them.
brandon272 10y ago
Using Twilio to get around the verification may be obvious if you are a HN reader, but most people have no idea what Twilio is. Phone verification is certainly not a bulletproof solution, but I have to feel it would help a lot. And it doesn't have to stop at phone, either. You could multiple levels of verification, like Airbnb. Then as a user you could further filter how strict you want your tweet exposure to be.
- dictum 10y ago
  > Using Twilio to get around the verification may be obvious if you are a HN reader, but most people have no idea what Twilio is 4chan isn't a bunch of computer illiterate folks, either.
  - brandon272 10y ago
    Yep. Phone verification certainly isn't bulletproof. But reducing the deluge of abusive posts by troll accounts featuring Pepe memes as their profile image even 10 or 20% would be tremendous, in my view.
fnord123 10y ago
Every hurdle helps. Like OpenBSD `pledge`. It doesn't stop everything and processes like bash can fork/exec to unwrap the pledge wrapper. But it helps get in the way of return oriented programming. Theo de Raadt had a good description of why every hurdle helps, but I can't find it. :(

harveywi 10y ago

This is actually a really good idea, as it would ensure that there is a citizen behind each Twitter account. Currently this lack of control hinders implementation of more effective systems for combating online abuse such as a social credit score system.

matt4077 10y ago

I'm pretty sure they're using phone verification, although it may differ depending on location and client device.