zlacker

The point made by the parent commenter was that you can join any group (if you get someone to invite you) related to a certain topic and get the phone numbers of everyone in that group.

I am not sure about the situation in the US, but in Europe almost all phone numbers are directly linked to a certain person and address by the provider.

>>soziaw+(OP)
> The point

One of the points which, yes, I agree with, but I mainly responded to this:

> I can add phone numbers by enumeration into my contacts and Signal will show who among my contacts is on it.\

> I am not sure about the situation in the US, but in Europe almost all phone numbers are directly linked to a certain person and address by the provider.

Or you can go to a corner shop and buy a Lyca or Lebara SIM with cash. No need to give them your address. You can buy top ups in cash as well. At least in Western Europe this is available everywhere, pretty much.

(I'd still prefer if Signal didn't require phone number to sign up though.)

>>hjek+Hi
> Or you can go to a corner shop and buy a Lyca or Lebara SIM with cash. No need to give them your address. You can buy top ups in cash as well. At least in Western Europe this is available everywhere, pretty much.

This is not legal in Norway.

>>sadfkl+po
There are many countries it isn't legal in, which is a shame. The ability to get an anonymous phone ought to be something people care about preserving.

>>jhauri+kq
It's illegal in the vast majority of countries [1] including Germany, France. Attempting to build a safe secure communication system around phone numbers that is suitable for situations like this, relying on them as being somehow anonymous, is just a complete non-starter. Even if you don't have to register the phone number, the cell provider will still know your location history. I think it just shows how America-centric Signal is.

[1] https://privacyinternational.org/long-read/3018/timeline-sim...

>>uberco+Fy
Then just setup your own Signal-Server, if you don't want a connected number at all, OTR over tor is the way to go.

>>hjek+Hi
I've had to provide "home" address and passport/identity docs to purchase SIM cards in Norway, Germany, and Italy. I believe Chile will not sell SIMs to non-citizens.

Off the top of my head, I think it was easier in France (although this was 16 years ago), Iceland, UK. I also recall it being easy in Aus/NZ. Fairly easy in the US as well, I believe, but as I'm a resident, I don't think too much about what address to use when having a prepaid SIM shipped to me, nor do I ever expect to have to show my papers for something like this. (although, of course, a postpaid account usually involves a credit inquiry, so ID docs would be used privately, not for government reasons, for what that's worth).

>>hjek+Hi
> Or you can go to a corner shop and buy a Lyca or Lebara SIM with cash.

Which is still a stable identifier that other people know you by, so you will likely keep it a long time and amass a trail of location data. Also its trivial to tie to the IMEI, so if you actually want to change nyms you have to buy a new phone as well.

Everything about the legacy phone system is a liability. Contact discovery is difficult, but tying into phone numbers should be optional and only for the duration of setting up a contact. Using phone numbers for long-lived identifiers is insane.