OP – An API giving real phone numbers to agents

op.inc

3 points·joghacker··3 comments

Hi HN,

Me and my friend just started working on OP.

We made it because everything out there that gives agents a phone number are just abstractions of Twilio, and only give out VoIP numbers. But these types of numbers don't really let agents be useful on the web, since VoIP numbers get blocked for most use cases like 2FA codes, form inputs, and callbacks.

That's why we think an API that let's an agent use a real carrier-backed number would be helpful. We really want feedback tho, so feel free to try the free tier on op.inc or op.inc/skills.md

While this seems like a great move for agents, your key challenge will be fighting spammers trying to use it. On top of that, you're sending over P2P routes instead of A2P routes which is against the carriers' terms of service and will likely lead to numbers getting blocked.

It's a little different because they're building for iMessage instead of just SMS, but you might look at the comments on this launch: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48267829

I think something will need to change here to give agents access to systems, but this doesn't really work with the way telecoms are currently set up.

yes i agree this is somewhat of a "for now" solution. but the point is that people are already creating agents that need independent digital identities, so this should help them do it a little easier.

then we hope to work on the next iteration of what agent identity actually looks like

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