3 ms·

Let me add one that I ran into, which doing a search a whole slew of people have. Their MFA simply does not work - not in edge cases - in very basic straight f

Let me add one that I ran into, which doing a search a whole slew of people have. Their MFA simply does not work - not in edge cases - in very basic straight forward cases. I sign up for an account. It wants a phone number. I enter the phone number. It sends a text to validate it. Except it never sends the text. I go into my profile and enter it there. It still wants me to enter it for validation, and wants to send a text. Which it again never sends. You can try the next day, you can try two weeks later - they just don't send a text. My carrier is sprint/tmobile, spam/phishing protection is disabled. And no, like most other places, they won't robocall you and voice-read you the code. A month later, your account is blocked because you didn't validate it. Now, this is for their free accounts. If you pay them, this issue does not exist. In online forums, their support staff make ridiculous claims: our mfa server is down (for 2 weeks?), reinstall your browser, here's some instructions on how to click the "send sms" button. So I use free microsoft accounts as temp accounts for orders that are going to spam me, and when they die in a month - all good. Here's the thing though - for all of microsoft's user hostile practices, google's products are fifty times worse. funny thing though - if you look at smaller shops specializing in one or two products, you don't have to use microsoft or google stuff, and there is a better alternative for everything those two make.

kjaftaedi 5y ago
Considering their mfa is depended on by millions of people daily and is a critical part of many people's infrastructure, it would be near impossible for Microsoft to have any outages for more than a few minutes that aren't reported around the world.
ryankrage77 5y ago
> MFA simply does not work - not in edge cases - in very basic straight forward cases I completely agree. At my workplace, attempting to add your account to the MFA app fails. If you click on the big obvious 'add account' button, it asks you to sign in to the account you're setting up MFA for. And when you enter your username and password, it then redirects to the MFA setup page and asks you to set up MFA. And if you follow those prompts, you end up back at the sign-in page. And so on. Instead, you have to skip past the obvious 'add account' button, and click on a + symbol in the top right, and from there you can add the account by scanning a QR code generated on the MFA settings page.
- soylentnewsorg 5y ago
  FYI: that QR code thing is The world standard for configuring an RSA soft token.
- tomerv 5y ago
  Yeah, it's really easy to get into an infinite loop with the various Microsoft login screens.
hpcjoe 5y ago
I've had trouble with all the services (MSFT and others) sending texts. I blame Verizon more than the big tech folks though, as their SMS is remarkably unreliable. That said, my first pass through MSFT 2FA hell left me with the indelible impression that they really didn't understand 2FA. I only reluctantly use their products, and have been hit with various "Temporary problem" when attempting to login. Its worse with SSO, in case you are not sure. More to the point, every scenario where I'm forced to use a MSFT product, another product exists which does a far better job, with far fewer bugs, far better performance, and far better UX/UI. Its as if MSFT hates users.
CrendKing 5y ago
There is possibility that you configured your T-mobile account to block certain or even all SMS. It happened to me before. Especially if you are in a family account and someone else is the primary account holder, and they mistakenly configured your line.
- soylentnewsorg 5y ago
  which is the first thing I checked. which is why I also specifically stated it does this with spam filters and text blocking off. it's in two places: there's an option in you call plan (which is not in mine) and there's a toggle in the portal. You have to have both the service plan option, and the toggle on. I have neither. The thing is, this was an issue with both sprint and tmobile (before the merger). if you google for it, you'll see people on att and verizon are having this issue as well. I think the op was correct - they're purposely making it hostile for users of the free tier. which is hilarious, because they do show you ads on the webmail client. you'd figure they'd want people using their email.. which i do. for spam, with the bonus that I don't have to deactivate the account - they kill it for me after i can't validate in a month. it's finally a feature.
keypusher 5y ago
> for all of microsoft's user hostile practices, google's products are fifty times worse. I’ve never experienced any of these issues with Google Authenticator, or heard of anyone experiencing anything similar.
- soylentnewsorg 5y ago
  google authenticator is not the same thing. that's an rsa soft token type thing, not a text to your phone. if you want issues with google texts on cell phones, pick a bad word, add "google fi" to it, and you'll get some hits. then repeat that for google voice. now, what you can compare it to, is when google sends you an sms for authentication. and you don't get it, and they lock your account. customer service - sure, chat from your phone, as long as you have their app, and if you don't, then install their app - from google play, which is locked because you can't confirm your phone number. then figure out they locked your gmail, phone, and all google apps, while deleting all your data. why? because you worked with a dev on an app 3 years ago, and that dev was found by google to work with another dev 2 years ago, who is now a russian hacker. online chat? you need to log in first. phone number to call? they don't have a phone. you are free to google for an hour to somehow contact them, and a big if/then loop they call AI will reply with an off-topic template, then delete your youtube channel. if you complain more, they'll trash your employer's production servers in GCP.
emmelaich 5y ago
If you're not in the USA, Amazon and perhaps Microsoft do stupid fucking things with a mobile number.
- soylentnewsorg 5y ago
  when I lived in france i had a second french phone#. amazon worked great. then I was in kiev for a year, and it worked alright with their local number too. but amazon i never had an issue with, maybe because i've had an account with them from the days when they only sold books. but i actually completely stopped using amazon years ago - the fake crap and fake reviews make the experience not worth my time.

kjaftaedi 5y ago

Considering their mfa is depended on by millions of people daily and is a critical part of many people's infrastructure, it would be near impossible for Microsoft to have any outages for more than a few minutes that aren't reported around the world.

ryankrage77 5y ago

> MFA simply does not work - not in edge cases - in very basic straight forward cases I completely agree. At my workplace, attempting to add your account to the MFA app fails. If you click on the big obvious 'add account' button, it asks you to sign in to the account you're setting up MFA for. And when you enter your username and password, it then redirects to the MFA setup page and asks you to set up MFA. And if you follow those prompts, you end up back at the sign-in page. And so on. Instead, you have to skip past the obvious 'add account' button, and click on a + symbol in the top right, and from there you can add the account by scanning a QR code generated on the MFA settings page.

soylentnewsorg 5y ago
FYI: that QR code thing is The world standard for configuring an RSA soft token.
tomerv 5y ago
Yeah, it's really easy to get into an infinite loop with the various Microsoft login screens.

hpcjoe 5y ago

I've had trouble with all the services (MSFT and others) sending texts. I blame Verizon more than the big tech folks though, as their SMS is remarkably unreliable. That said, my first pass through MSFT 2FA hell left me with the indelible impression that they really didn't understand 2FA. I only reluctantly use their products, and have been hit with various "Temporary problem" when attempting to login. Its worse with SSO, in case you are not sure. More to the point, every scenario where I'm forced to use a MSFT product, another product exists which does a far better job, with far fewer bugs, far better performance, and far better UX/UI. Its as if MSFT hates users.

CrendKing 5y ago

There is possibility that you configured your T-mobile account to block certain or even all SMS. It happened to me before. Especially if you are in a family account and someone else is the primary account holder, and they mistakenly configured your line.

soylentnewsorg 5y ago
which is the first thing I checked. which is why I also specifically stated it does this with spam filters and text blocking off. it's in two places: there's an option in you call plan (which is not in mine) and there's a toggle in the portal. You have to have both the service plan option, and the toggle on. I have neither. The thing is, this was an issue with both sprint and tmobile (before the merger). if you google for it, you'll see people on att and verizon are having this issue as well. I think the op was correct - they're purposely making it hostile for users of the free tier. which is hilarious, because they do show you ads on the webmail client. you'd figure they'd want people using their email.. which i do. for spam, with the bonus that I don't have to deactivate the account - they kill it for me after i can't validate in a month. it's finally a feature.

keypusher 5y ago

> for all of microsoft's user hostile practices, google's products are fifty times worse. I’ve never experienced any of these issues with Google Authenticator, or heard of anyone experiencing anything similar.

soylentnewsorg 5y ago
google authenticator is not the same thing. that's an rsa soft token type thing, not a text to your phone. if you want issues with google texts on cell phones, pick a bad word, add "google fi" to it, and you'll get some hits. then repeat that for google voice. now, what you can compare it to, is when google sends you an sms for authentication. and you don't get it, and they lock your account. customer service - sure, chat from your phone, as long as you have their app, and if you don't, then install their app - from google play, which is locked because you can't confirm your phone number. then figure out they locked your gmail, phone, and all google apps, while deleting all your data. why? because you worked with a dev on an app 3 years ago, and that dev was found by google to work with another dev 2 years ago, who is now a russian hacker. online chat? you need to log in first. phone number to call? they don't have a phone. you are free to google for an hour to somehow contact them, and a big if/then loop they call AI will reply with an off-topic template, then delete your youtube channel. if you complain more, they'll trash your employer's production servers in GCP.

emmelaich 5y ago

If you're not in the USA, Amazon and perhaps Microsoft do stupid fucking things with a mobile number.

soylentnewsorg 5y ago
when I lived in france i had a second french phone#. amazon worked great. then I was in kiev for a year, and it worked alright with their local number too. but amazon i never had an issue with, maybe because i've had an account with them from the days when they only sold books. but i actually completely stopped using amazon years ago - the fake crap and fake reviews make the experience not worth my time.