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Comment by anhner | Hacker News Reader

Requiring phone number is a straight no go from me, sorry.

And it rejects my german phone number. So, double fail. What's this obsession with using phone numbers. It's 2024! Any scammer can buy a burner phone. Owning a phone proves nothing other than that you own a phone.

I hate tying phone numbers to identity but it is a way to slow down the ability to create massive heaps of bot accounts. There really isn't a better way. (Insert "better ways" that aren't actually better ways below)

Did you possibly enter the prefix +49 as part of the number?

It seems to expect a number without the country prefix, starting with a number like "174" or whatever your provider prefix is...

I tried all sorts of variations of my number. It just won't take it. I expect their validation is wonky/buggy. I used to work for Nokia and remember talking to people responsible for parsing phone numbers. This is not a trivial problem.

Anyway, it hard rejects +49176..., 0049176..., 0176..., 176...; it correctly normalizes each of those to +49176... and then rejects the number. My number is fine. Their validation isn't.

Anyway, for a new social network to repeat the security/privacy mistake of its predecessors (wrongly assuming phone operators are trustworthy and users never change their number) is just madness. Doesn't instill a lot of confidence that a lot of thought went into the whole thing.

IMHO, phone numbers as a thing should just go away completely. Weird legacy identifiers from the last century. Absolutely no redeeming features. Hard to remember, easy to spoof. Etc. Why build your new network on the crumbling remains of an old one and give a lot of control to the typical abusers of the phone system (spammers, scammers, oppressive regimes, etc.)?

Sorry about this. We've just made some changes to make this less likely of an issue going forward.

Same problem with my Norwegian phone number just now.

It requires a phone number now? That's weird. The invites didn't require a phone number.

Because the numbers were limited before and now they've thrown open the doors to massive botnetting.

Understandable! We hope to relax this but we felt it was necessary to maintain the quality of the network for now.

I thought that is why you might have required it, but on the other hand for malicious actors it's trivial to get a phone number unrelated to them, while legitimate users are giving up their only phone number, possibly exposing it to scammers and robocalls (in case of a breach), or having something linking to their real identity.

Anyway, hoping you revisit this one day and that's also when I will try your app again. Wishing you luck!

Doesn't this go against the comic in the post that claims that it's easy to block what you don't want to see? Also that it's an open network? Why not just let everyone in if the moderation tools are good?

I definitely would never give my phone number to a social network.

The SMS verification requirement is only for the Bluesky operated PDS host. Soon (this month) it will be possible for others to self-host their own PDS hosts that do not have this requirement.

how will the bluesky PDS deal with the flood of spammers on malicious PDSs, like, why is the phone number a useful gatekeeping tool if you're just going to fling open the gates at the end of the month?

We do have an anti-abuse tool to help flag abuse. It is obviously important that PDS operators not allow themselves to become overrun with abusive users.

Anyone technical can run their own single-user or low-user-count PDS and probably not have to worry about any problems.

Having good tools to increase the quality of your network doesn't mean you should willingly let the whole network decline in quality.

You assume that requiring a phone number increases quality instead of decreases it. I see it as a filter to keep thoughtful people off the platform.

Let's say you just eliminate the requirement altogether. What percentage of non-phone number signups are going to be "thoughtful people" compared to bots?

Sure you'll get people who refuse to sign up with a real phone number, that's a given. Some percentage of those people will be "thoughtful." You'll also eliminate a huge number of bots, automated signups, etc.

It's hard to argue letting all those bots on will not decrease system quality.

do you have an example of a platform that does not require a phone number for sms verification and is filled with bots? we have many that use sms verification and are infested with abusive content and bots.

Can people bypass the phone number requirement with invites? I still have a few invites left and I am wondering if they have value going forward.

Long time user here, this is definitely not the way to go.

I think we'd all rather not be flooded by bots so no reason to change

How can phone validation work in a supposedly open federated ecosystem?

Likely a means of reducing bot accounts..

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