Google deleting all recently inactive accounts without phone number
7 comments
> This is a very shady dark pattern by Alphabet corporation.
Advertising company (Doubleclick [1]) wants phone numbers to better target ads. No surprise there.
[1] The company currently calling itself Google is not the same Google as yesteryear. In 2008 Google purchased Doubleclick, and what happened is that the advertising rot from Doubleclick ate Google from the inside out. What we have now calling itself Google is actually all the evil that was Doubleclick, only calling itself Google. That's why the Google motto no longer includes "Don't be evil".
Advertising company (Doubleclick [1]) wants phone numbers to better target ads. No surprise there.
[1] The company currently calling itself Google is not the same Google as yesteryear. In 2008 Google purchased Doubleclick, and what happened is that the advertising rot from Doubleclick ate Google from the inside out. What we have now calling itself Google is actually all the evil that was Doubleclick, only calling itself Google. That's why the Google motto no longer includes "Don't be evil".
I've often read that 2FA should be through an authenticator app or a physical key, not via texting a code to a phone number. Malicious sim swapping is a thing, so purposely deleting any phone number from an account should be good practice, right?
So will they also delete inactive accounts that have no phone number, but one or more phone-less 2FA methods associated?
So will they also delete inactive accounts that have no phone number, but one or more phone-less 2FA methods associated?
They default to authing you via a sms code usually still, even when you have an authenticator paired
It's phonishness. Your life isn't real unless you have a smartphone -- at least that's the way "the empire" sees it.
if you haven't cared about using an account for a year, why do you want to use it all of a sudden now?
The next aspiring trillionaire can take note of that argument when scamming people out of their retirement funds.
If you haven't used your $whatever in a year, why do you want to use it now? Replace $whatever with whatever you want and you'll see how absurd this question is.
"Urgent: Sign in to your Google Account if you want to keep it"
But then it doesn't matter if you log in with the correct username and password and receive the PIN via your email. This is isn't enough. Unless a phone number is somehow added to the account one gets,
"You can’t recover your account at this time because Google doesn’t have enough info to be sure this account is yours."
This is despite having all information ever associated with the account. Unless that account has a phone number it will be deleted. This is a very shady dark pattern by Alphabet corporation.