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My mother tried to buy something on Amazon yesterday. It wouldn't let her check-out until she'd entered a code sent via WhatsApp. Which she doesn't have and d

My mother tried to buy something on Amazon yesterday. It wouldn't let her check-out until she'd entered a code sent via WhatsApp. Which she doesn't have and doesn't want. She'll be buying her tat on eBay in future. I dream that Amazon will lose lots of sales and backtrack, but I don't suppose they will.

NuclearPM 3mo ago
What is a tat?
- seanhunter 3mo ago
  “Tat” means miscellaneous junk. That said, the anecdote is made up or important details have been elided to make it sound more interesting than it is. Amazon doesn’t depend on whatsapp for 2fa. You can configure amazon 2fa to send an SMS and it’s possible that the poster’s mother has misconfigured her phone to claim that it needs whatsapp to read the sms 2fa message but I highly doubt even that. When I look on amazon it allows passkeys, regular TOTP like with DUO authenticator or google authenticator or whatever or SMS with a backup of sending the TOTP code to the registered email on the account. Whatsapp isn’t even an option.
  - giardini 3mo ago
    How does "tat" differ from "grot"?
    - 6031769 3mo ago
      Grot is usually intentionally and always utterly unfit for purpose.
    - card_zero 3mo ago
      Grot is from grotesque and implies dirty or primal, as in grotto, a cave. Sans-serif fonts were called grotesque because they looked primitive. The word grot appears in various 19th century poems as a noun meaning a grotto, where it was supposed to be a lovely place full of fairies. But that meaning wore off and now something grotty is something you'd find in a gutter. The US equivalent is grody. Tat meanwhile, like gunny, refers to a kind of sackcloth. These words are both from Hindi. The concept is of some cheap filler material. If you want to rush something out, you can wrap it in sackcloth, bag it up in sackcloth, sell it to them in sackcloth, make it quickly out of sackcloth. Or maybe it was left over and has been sitting in a corner for years, at the bottom of a sack. That is "some old tat".
    - ChrisRR 3mo ago
      Tat is general rubbish, but generally implies something a bit old fashioned as well. Those decorative plates and figures that old people love? Tat Grot I've never heard of in terms of buying stuff. Grot to me just implies something dirty
      - giardini 3mo ago
        Thank you all for the explications! My first encounter with "grot" was a BBC comedy, apparently " The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin", wherein a gentleman suffering a mid-life crisis tries to fail at business. However no matter what he does, everything he touches turns to money! At the end he sets up a series of shops named "GROT" which, of course, sell grot and also become enormously successful.
  - phs318u 3mo ago
    Perhaps the options vary by region?
- felooboolooomba 3mo ago
  tat n. anything that looks cheap, is of low quality, or in bad condition: * Like most souvenir shops, it sells a lot of old tat. * I'm not spending fifty quid on a piece of tat. People buy it all the time when they practice retail therapy.
walrus01 3mo ago
Are you sure it was actually via whatsapp, and not just a six digit code sent via regular SMS to the phone number on record for her account? It's possible whatsapp on her phone has simply hijacked the SMS client functionality and set itself as the default.
- NetMageSCW 3mo ago
  “which she doesn’t have and doesn’t want”
- subscribed 3mo ago
  > "WhatsApp on her phone" GP clearly said she doesn't have WhatsApp.
  - walrus01 3mo ago
    If I had a dollar for every time I've seen an older person that doesn't even know what application they're running, or can't tell the difference between the content of a website inside a browser window and an application that runs natively on their computer. I read what the GP wrote, I'm saying there's a non zero possibility she's misunderstanding something. It seems like something you have to specifically choose, on the amazon account side. https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=TZJvM20USFlkA03xwj https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeI...
    - subscribed 3mo ago
      I choose to not call a GP a liar or too thick for being unable to differentiate between apps :) I also chose their presumed first hand statement than your unrelated experience with unrelated third parties. Your point re: having to subscribe to WhatsApp notifications, if we're staying in the realm of "what ifs" and looking for the awkward but possible ways to discredit the claims, I can believe that she was enrolled without being asked. I've seen at least one person complaining about that exact scenario. Cheers!
      - 3mo ago
dude187 3mo ago
Sure it was Amazon? Sounds like a scam
dude187 3mo ago
Sure it was Amazon? Sounds like a scam
- deltoidmaximus 3mo ago
  The frustrating part is that since so many companies collect PII under the guise of security (and then use it for advertising) it's harder to tell if this is a legal scam or illegal scam.
  - dylan604 3mo ago
    >if this is a legal scam or illegal scam. the fact this is something to be distinguished says a lot about where we are now and none of what it says is good
    - inigyou 3mo ago
      He calls "legal scam" what you probably call "legit business"
- masfuerte 3mo ago
  Yes. I'd gone round to see her and I checked her history to ensure it wasn't dodgy.
- jayGlow 3mo ago
  I has Facebook send a verification through Whatsapp, I legitimately thought it was a scam until I googled it and realized they do actually send verification that way.
  - delecti 3mo ago
    Still annoying, but at least then it's the same company.
hnlmorg 3mo ago
Which country was this? I’ve never known Amazon requiring WhatsApp. It uses SMS a lot. The only service I’ve used which does offer WhatsApp as a form of identification is PayPal. But even that is just one of many different authorisation options. I don’t have WhatsApp either and never once found that to be a limiting. So I wonder if the experience your relative was having is more nuanced than suggested.
- mrec 3mo ago
  I've never had it require SMS either. Probably because I've never given it a portable telephone number. (Until a couple of years ago I didn't have one, and I still use it as little as possible.)
whoopdedo 3mo ago
> She'll be buying her tat on eBay in future. A third of the things I buy* from eBay come shipped by Amazon. I can't always tell if they were using the warehouse for logistics or the seller is doing arbitrage. Either way, it would seem Amazon isn't bothered by people "voting with their wallet". (*That are new of course, used and open-box still come from the seller as I expect.)

NuclearPM 3mo ago

What is a tat?

seanhunter 3mo ago
“Tat” means miscellaneous junk. That said, the anecdote is made up or important details have been elided to make it sound more interesting than it is. Amazon doesn’t depend on whatsapp for 2fa. You can configure amazon 2fa to send an SMS and it’s possible that the poster’s mother has misconfigured her phone to claim that it needs whatsapp to read the sms 2fa message but I highly doubt even that. When I look on amazon it allows passkeys, regular TOTP like with DUO authenticator or google authenticator or whatever or SMS with a backup of sending the TOTP code to the registered email on the account. Whatsapp isn’t even an option.
- giardini 3mo ago
  How does "tat" differ from "grot"?
  - 6031769 3mo ago
    Grot is usually intentionally and always utterly unfit for purpose.
  - card_zero 3mo ago
    Grot is from grotesque and implies dirty or primal, as in grotto, a cave. Sans-serif fonts were called grotesque because they looked primitive. The word grot appears in various 19th century poems as a noun meaning a grotto, where it was supposed to be a lovely place full of fairies. But that meaning wore off and now something grotty is something you'd find in a gutter. The US equivalent is grody. Tat meanwhile, like gunny, refers to a kind of sackcloth. These words are both from Hindi. The concept is of some cheap filler material. If you want to rush something out, you can wrap it in sackcloth, bag it up in sackcloth, sell it to them in sackcloth, make it quickly out of sackcloth. Or maybe it was left over and has been sitting in a corner for years, at the bottom of a sack. That is "some old tat".
  - ChrisRR 3mo ago
    Tat is general rubbish, but generally implies something a bit old fashioned as well. Those decorative plates and figures that old people love? Tat Grot I've never heard of in terms of buying stuff. Grot to me just implies something dirty
    - giardini 3mo ago
      Thank you all for the explications! My first encounter with "grot" was a BBC comedy, apparently " The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin", wherein a gentleman suffering a mid-life crisis tries to fail at business. However no matter what he does, everything he touches turns to money! At the end he sets up a series of shops named "GROT" which, of course, sell grot and also become enormously successful.
- phs318u 3mo ago
  Perhaps the options vary by region?
felooboolooomba 3mo ago
tat n. anything that looks cheap, is of low quality, or in bad condition: * Like most souvenir shops, it sells a lot of old tat. * I'm not spending fifty quid on a piece of tat. People buy it all the time when they practice retail therapy.

walrus01 3mo ago

Are you sure it was actually via whatsapp, and not just a six digit code sent via regular SMS to the phone number on record for her account? It's possible whatsapp on her phone has simply hijacked the SMS client functionality and set itself as the default.

NetMageSCW 3mo ago
“which she doesn’t have and doesn’t want”
subscribed 3mo ago
> "WhatsApp on her phone" GP clearly said she doesn't have WhatsApp.
- walrus01 3mo ago
  If I had a dollar for every time I've seen an older person that doesn't even know what application they're running, or can't tell the difference between the content of a website inside a browser window and an application that runs natively on their computer. I read what the GP wrote, I'm saying there's a non zero possibility she's misunderstanding something. It seems like something you have to specifically choose, on the amazon account side. https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=TZJvM20USFlkA03xwj https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeI...
  - subscribed 3mo ago
    I choose to not call a GP a liar or too thick for being unable to differentiate between apps :) I also chose their presumed first hand statement than your unrelated experience with unrelated third parties. Your point re: having to subscribe to WhatsApp notifications, if we're staying in the realm of "what ifs" and looking for the awkward but possible ways to discredit the claims, I can believe that she was enrolled without being asked. I've seen at least one person complaining about that exact scenario. Cheers!
    - 3mo ago

dude187 3mo ago

Sure it was Amazon? Sounds like a scam

dude187 3mo ago

Sure it was Amazon? Sounds like a scam

deltoidmaximus 3mo ago
The frustrating part is that since so many companies collect PII under the guise of security (and then use it for advertising) it's harder to tell if this is a legal scam or illegal scam.
- dylan604 3mo ago
  >if this is a legal scam or illegal scam. the fact this is something to be distinguished says a lot about where we are now and none of what it says is good
  - inigyou 3mo ago
    He calls "legal scam" what you probably call "legit business"
masfuerte 3mo ago
Yes. I'd gone round to see her and I checked her history to ensure it wasn't dodgy.
jayGlow 3mo ago
I has Facebook send a verification through Whatsapp, I legitimately thought it was a scam until I googled it and realized they do actually send verification that way.
- delecti 3mo ago
  Still annoying, but at least then it's the same company.

hnlmorg 3mo ago

Which country was this? I’ve never known Amazon requiring WhatsApp. It uses SMS a lot. The only service I’ve used which does offer WhatsApp as a form of identification is PayPal. But even that is just one of many different authorisation options. I don’t have WhatsApp either and never once found that to be a limiting. So I wonder if the experience your relative was having is more nuanced than suggested.

mrec 3mo ago
I've never had it require SMS either. Probably because I've never given it a portable telephone number. (Until a couple of years ago I didn't have one, and I still use it as little as possible.)

whoopdedo 3mo ago

> She'll be buying her tat on eBay in future. A third of the things I buy* from eBay come shipped by Amazon. I can't always tell if they were using the warehouse for logistics or the seller is doing arbitrage. Either way, it would seem Amazon isn't bothered by people "voting with their wallet". (*That are new of course, used and open-box still come from the seller as I expect.)