3 ms·

That's a good thing. Forcing people to give their phone number to use an instant messaging app/protocol is a sign the company just wants your private data. Als

That's a good thing. Forcing people to give their phone number to use an instant messaging app/protocol is a sign the company just wants your private data. Also, by doing that and letting the account existence be publicly known, anyone with their phone number will know that they have an account on that service and lets you try to contact them. That can range from privacy violation to life-in-danger situations.

blippage 4y ago
I adamantly refuse to register for accounts that require my phone number unless it's for commercial or official purposes. The likes of Google, Facebook and Microsoft can go take a long walk off a short plank. We give too much information away. Companies have shown that they are incapable of keeping the information private anyway. We get big scandals, the interwebs kick up a big stink, brows are furrowed, and then we go back to doing what we did before with nobody learning anything.
- miroljub 4y ago
  I agree with you when it comes to random apps, but messengers are probably the only exception where I accept it. If I gave my phone number to someone, I made an implicit social contract with that person or organization that they may contact me using that phone number. I don't see it as a big stretch if they use that number to send me a message or call me using WhatsApp, Signal or any other messenger where I registered using that same number. It's for the same purpose of communication, after all. If I don't want to be contacted, I just don't share that number. And it's not like people don't know that messengers or social networks can collect contact metadata about messages and calls. It's what traditional landline and mobile providers have been doing for ages.
noio 4y ago
I find phone numbers awesome because you actually "own" them to some degree. (i.e. you can take your number to a new provider). Moving to a different messenger app with the same phone number means I can at least still find some of my network there. Only email on your own domain would have that feature. I don't really care if they sell my phone number, it's already out there, I don't consider it private data anymore.
- ale42 4y ago
  Quite true. It would be better, though, to be able to use an instant messaging system using a simple identifier lie an e-mail address, as an alternative to a phone number. Simply because there are quite some people out there who mainly want to message on a computer, and want to keep only some kind of messages on their phones.
  - tut-urut-utut 4y ago
    Delta Chat. It’s basically an email client disguised as a messenger.

blippage 4y ago

I adamantly refuse to register for accounts that require my phone number unless it's for commercial or official purposes. The likes of Google, Facebook and Microsoft can go take a long walk off a short plank. We give too much information away. Companies have shown that they are incapable of keeping the information private anyway. We get big scandals, the interwebs kick up a big stink, brows are furrowed, and then we go back to doing what we did before with nobody learning anything.

miroljub 4y ago
I agree with you when it comes to random apps, but messengers are probably the only exception where I accept it. If I gave my phone number to someone, I made an implicit social contract with that person or organization that they may contact me using that phone number. I don't see it as a big stretch if they use that number to send me a message or call me using WhatsApp, Signal or any other messenger where I registered using that same number. It's for the same purpose of communication, after all. If I don't want to be contacted, I just don't share that number. And it's not like people don't know that messengers or social networks can collect contact metadata about messages and calls. It's what traditional landline and mobile providers have been doing for ages.

noio 4y ago

I find phone numbers awesome because you actually "own" them to some degree. (i.e. you can take your number to a new provider). Moving to a different messenger app with the same phone number means I can at least still find some of my network there. Only email on your own domain would have that feature. I don't really care if they sell my phone number, it's already out there, I don't consider it private data anymore.

ale42 4y ago
Quite true. It would be better, though, to be able to use an instant messaging system using a simple identifier lie an e-mail address, as an alternative to a phone number. Simply because there are quite some people out there who mainly want to message on a computer, and want to keep only some kind of messages on their phones.
- tut-urut-utut 4y ago
  Delta Chat. It’s basically an email client disguised as a messenger.