37 lines
2.8 KiB
Markdown
37 lines
2.8 KiB
Markdown
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title = "Google Account Signup forces you to submit phone number if you use Firefox"
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date = "2020-05-12"
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author = "Ceda EI"
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tags = ["firefox", "google", "privacy", "chrome"]
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keywords = ["firefox", "google", "privacy", "chrome"]
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description = "Google Account Signup forces you to submit phone number if you use Firefox"
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showFullContent = false
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A few weeks ago, I needed to create a Google Account since my college teachers have decided to use Google Classroom (yes, they are violating Google's [TOS](https://support.google.com/edu/classroom/answer/6025224) by not using a Google Education Suite.). I have ditched all Google Services quite a long time ago and made my previous account dormant (There are a few YouTube videos hosted with it so I didn't delete it). Thus, I decided to create a new account for the sake of Google Classroom. Started the standard procedure, went to Google, clicked Sign In, clicked Create Account.
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Pretty standard so far. I fill in the details and this is the next page I arrive at.
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Okay, I can't skip this apparently. I am pretty privacy paranoid and I definitely don't want to give my phone number to Google. So, I started thinking why would they need my phone number. The first obvious thought is that they require it for anti-spam. The next thought was if they require it for everybody. I take a screenshot and start ranting about it in a group of friends. One of them tries making an account and this does not show up for him. Weird, I thought. Turns out he was using Google Chrome. Instead after filling in the name and basic details, he is prompted with this page instead.
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I thought, that this might be because of the privacy addons I am using. So, I created a fresh firefox profile with no addons, no history, nothing. Just a stock Firefox browser. Same, still asks me for phone number to verify. I asked the same friend who did not get a request asking for phone number while using Google Chrome to try out via Firefox. Same results for him. I tried Chrome and I wasn't asked for phone number either.
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Here is the list of all tried combinations.
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| Operating System | Browser | Location | Asked for Phone Number |
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|------------------|----------|----------|------------------------|
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| Linux | Firefox | India | Yes |
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| Windows | Firefox | India | Yes |
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| Windows | Firefox | Europe | Yes |
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| Linux | Chrome | India | No |
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| Windows | Chrome | India | No |
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| Windows | Chrome | Europe | No |
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So, to sum up, if we were using Firefox, we were forced to enter phone number. If we were using Google Chrome, we were not.
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