zlacker

>>wut42+(OP)
> The court orders show the government telling Google to provide the names, addresses, telephone numbers and user activity for all Google account users who accessed the YouTube videos..

Hopefully that clarifies for some folks why these big tech/social media companies insist on having your phone number as a “2FA for security” despite all the sim-swap attacks.. simply for this moment, because you might be using a VPN, and address/name aren’t in your google account, but definitely your phone number is there, it’s even worse if you’re using an android too, as they probably will pull out all your app/browsing history..

>>tamimi+ya
"Guys, we know our users' names, addresses, all of their emails, browsing history, location history and contacts... but we're missing the critical information! Their phone numbers! Can anyone come up with a security justification for asking for it?"

-Nobody ever.

Come on, use your brain. Even if you are talking about smaller entities who might otherwise only have names and emails, why would they want phone numbers? They don't care about identifying you. And even if they did they already have your email and name.

Step away from the tin foil...

>>IshKeb+821
Brief counter, based on adtech knowledge.

Fingerprinting to a user, especially for a bulk request, without something to anchor on like a device id (or phone number), is harder than you make it out to be. End of third party cookies and so on has had an effect.