4 ms·

What's easier: to obtain state ID, or to sign up to a website with your preferred username and password?

oofbey 6mo ago
Obtaining your first id is obviously difficult. But so is obtaining your first computer. If you’re on good terms with your government, obtaining the id is easier. That’s really the key. Sure if you focus on hostile states this stuff all makes sense. If you’re insistent on hiding from authorities then many things become much more difficult, by design.
- balamatom 6mo ago
  That's not what I asked.
  - oofbey 6mo ago
    You asked the wrong question. Sorry if you still don’t understand why. Seems others are also trying to help you understand but maybe you don’t want to.
    - balamatom 6mo ago
      >You asked the wrong question. Oh, so there are "wrong questions" now? Yeah, I guess I'll have to get better at asking those real quick.
vel0city 6mo ago
Well, I and a lot of the people I'm going to talk to through things like Signal are going to have a state ID regardless as I live in a country where one practically needs to drive a car to function in society. On top of that so many other things just inherently expect one to have a phone number. It would be somewhat odd to not have a phone number for most of the people I know and talk to through platforms like Signal. So to your question of which is easier, having the state ID and a phone number is easier because I'll already have that for a multitude of reasons. If you live in a place where its rare to have a phone number, then yes I agree Signal probably isn't a good choice.
- balamatom 6mo ago
  That's not what I asked.
  - vel0city 6mo ago
    You asked which is easier, and I gave my answer. It's easier for me and many many many millions (billions?) of others to have a phone number and state ID, because we'll have already had a phone number and state ID on hand for decades beforehand and have shared that number with the people we're already talking to while making a new identifier and sharing it would be quite a bit more work. What's easier, using a tool that's already in your hand or going to the tool store, searching for a new one, and swapping to that one? Just using the tool already in your hands, that you're already using, that you've been using for a long time. It's exactly what you asked, just not the perspective you cared to look at.
    - balamatom 6mo ago
      In the time it took you to selectively bring various outside context "for perspective" (instead of answering the question as asked) you could've registered a brand new account with username, password, email confirmation, and OTP 2FA, on any service that supports those. If you insist that 2+2 equals "3 or 5 depending on perspective", ok sure let's work with your scenario of comparing registering a pre-existing state/telco ID with creating a brand new user/pass account (again: instead of what I asked you to compare). Well, suppose you were to lose your ID and/or your SIM - do you think you'd be able to renew them and regain access to your stuff in the same amount of time it's taking me to write this now? Plus, I guess you've never seen bad actors buy fake ID/SIM accounts faster than you can block 'em - and much more quickly than any individual good-faith actor (with a single ID/SIM honestly linked to meatspace) would able to get out of harm's way in such a scenario. >What's easier, using a tool that's already in your hand or going to the tool store, searching for a new one, and swapping to that one? Just using the tool already in your hands, that you're already using, that you've been using for a long time. Hammers, nails... You're trying to make it make sense by dumbing it down. In the end (again conforming to your framing), the "easier thing" is the one that fewer people will expend energy to prevent you from doing. And this last consideration kinda-sorta makes your reply be an answer to my question, except that I had to do the work of connecting the two, so now you owe me 100EUR.

Obtaining your first id is obviously difficult. But so is obtaining your first computer. If you’re on good terms with your government, obtaining the id is easier. That’s really the key. Sure if you focus on hostile states this stuff all makes sense. If you’re insistent on hiding from authorities then many things become much more difficult, by design.

balamatom 6mo ago
That's not what I asked.
- oofbey 6mo ago
  You asked the wrong question. Sorry if you still don’t understand why. Seems others are also trying to help you understand but maybe you don’t want to.
  - balamatom 6mo ago
    >You asked the wrong question. Oh, so there are "wrong questions" now? Yeah, I guess I'll have to get better at asking those real quick.

vel0city 6mo ago

Well, I and a lot of the people I'm going to talk to through things like Signal are going to have a state ID regardless as I live in a country where one practically needs to drive a car to function in society. On top of that so many other things just inherently expect one to have a phone number. It would be somewhat odd to not have a phone number for most of the people I know and talk to through platforms like Signal. So to your question of which is easier, having the state ID and a phone number is easier because I'll already have that for a multitude of reasons. If you live in a place where its rare to have a phone number, then yes I agree Signal probably isn't a good choice.

balamatom 6mo ago
That's not what I asked.
- vel0city 6mo ago
  You asked which is easier, and I gave my answer. It's easier for me and many many many millions (billions?) of others to have a phone number and state ID, because we'll have already had a phone number and state ID on hand for decades beforehand and have shared that number with the people we're already talking to while making a new identifier and sharing it would be quite a bit more work. What's easier, using a tool that's already in your hand or going to the tool store, searching for a new one, and swapping to that one? Just using the tool already in your hands, that you're already using, that you've been using for a long time. It's exactly what you asked, just not the perspective you cared to look at.
  - balamatom 6mo ago
    In the time it took you to selectively bring various outside context "for perspective" (instead of answering the question as asked) you could've registered a brand new account with username, password, email confirmation, and OTP 2FA, on any service that supports those. If you insist that 2+2 equals "3 or 5 depending on perspective", ok sure let's work with your scenario of comparing registering a pre-existing state/telco ID with creating a brand new user/pass account (again: instead of what I asked you to compare). Well, suppose you were to lose your ID and/or your SIM - do you think you'd be able to renew them and regain access to your stuff in the same amount of time it's taking me to write this now? Plus, I guess you've never seen bad actors buy fake ID/SIM accounts faster than you can block 'em - and much more quickly than any individual good-faith actor (with a single ID/SIM honestly linked to meatspace) would able to get out of harm's way in such a scenario. >What's easier, using a tool that's already in your hand or going to the tool store, searching for a new one, and swapping to that one? Just using the tool already in your hands, that you're already using, that you've been using for a long time. Hammers, nails... You're trying to make it make sense by dumbing it down. In the end (again conforming to your framing), the "easier thing" is the one that fewer people will expend energy to prevent you from doing. And this last consideration kinda-sorta makes your reply be an answer to my question, except that I had to do the work of connecting the two, so now you owe me 100EUR.