- cross-posted to:
- privacy@programming.dev
- cross-posted to:
- privacy@programming.dev
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Headline:
Signal is working on registration without a phone number. But what form will it take?
30 July 2026 10:30 CEST
Signal is working on a way to optionally sign up without a phone number. The feature has not yet been officially confirmed, and it is not yet known whether it will be available to all users or in what form.
Thank you!
Another W for Signal
I’ve always said it. Best form to prevent spam is to have allow list as a default. You should only be able to receive messages from pre-approved people.
I have allow listed my email for ages and it’s great.
But obviously advertisers and business hate it because then they need your true consent to send you shit.
And in the case of Telegram, if they did that why would anyone sign up for their premium account?
I tried using Telegram and the amount of spam I would receive was annoying, but what was even more annoying was finding out that the ‘Restrict messages from users not in your contacts’ setting is paywalled. Telegram profits off of the spammers on their network.
yep, i had that feature on, but then they paywalled it and now I’m getting some spam.
I don’t really use telegram and I will dump it soon.
Just a FYI, the nomenclature has moved to block/allow lists.
I had no idea. Makes sense. Thanks for saying.
Yeah, I had it pointed out to me last year.
Ten years too late.
This could have had a far greater impact when whatsapp exodus or controversy happend in 2021. I bet they have reached a stall in the number of new accounts and donations are drying out.
I have also read rumors about them thinking about tying this to a one time payment to prevent bot registration
They say they need to figure out how to counter/avoid spam/abuse first. And that makes a lot of sense to me. I mean, just look at Telegram (which is ironically going the opposite route nowadays).
Telegram requires a phone number, last I checked, and Desktop needs to be signed in to from mobile. So the same as Signal for “Abuse Prevention” ™
And it’s only good for connecting to bot networks to deliver… Questionable content.
Most of my torrents ceom from Telegram bots, now that sites keep getting taken down who hosted them.
As to actually using it?
Well, the only contacts I have are pirate bots, and that will never change.
Still more than I have on Signal, though ;)
I don’t believe Telegram desktop needed a mobile connection before and I used it for years and didn’t use a mobile client. I mostly used it as a bridge client for IRC and Matrix as the client itself was superior if you didn’t need privacy or encryption.
Telegram requires a phone number, last I checked
(which is ironically going the opposite route nowadays)
Well, I was worried about losing contact with the bots when I cancel my phone service, but maybe I won’t have to ;)
You can keep your number when switching networks.
I’m not switching, I’m cutting the phone entierly, no point in spending $100 a month to pay for spyware in my pocket as they keep taking features I want out and shoving more AI I don’t into them all while destroyihng encryption and extending the data collection and sales.
You should try GrapheneOS. It has none of that bullshit, and you don’t need to pay $100 per month if you use a cheaper sub brand like Visible or Mint instead of main Verizon/T-Mobile.
If I could get it on payments like they do Googlified ones I would, can’t afford to drop the cash for a Pixel to flash, or to order one with Graphene on it already.
Already on Lineage for the old tablet, and it mostly works, though they don’t sandbox Play Services like Graphene does so I just don’t have them on there.
And yet I get tons of spam on telegram, and the only way to prevent it is to subscribe to Telegram Premium
I’ll be happy if it happens but I need to see it. It would be significant to use Signal without phone number but one option they are considering to combat scam is to use bank card payment… Signal’s issue still remains the centralisaion
This is the main reason I don’t use Signal, so depending on if and how it gets implemented, I may finally use it. Getting other people on board will be its own fight of course.
We had an encrypted chat for a bit before I realized it was completely pointless with literally everyone in it but one or two having entirely stock phones with in-built Ai and tracking mechanisms. We used XMPP.
Since it was for a Jellyfin server, it basically meant anyone on an unmodified Google or Apple phone was basically a door to a seach of that data from either company for the text logged into each chatroom by each user, and displayed. Unless everyone is secure, no one is.
Sooo instead you will be required to pay by card and thus have your identity proven by financial institutions behind? Big ooof.
I think you’re jumping the gun a bit. They’re just saying that requiring a phone number added a barrier against spammers and they want to be sure this change doesn’t open the flood gates.
From the article:
"We gotta figure out some way to induce a cost for signing up without a phone number”, Kret said.
It’s unclear whether this means that registration without a phone number will become a paid feature.
However, “cost” does not necessarily mean a monetary fee; it could also refer to another barrier designed to prevent abuse.
Even if it was a card, privacy.com for the win as it allows for any address and name to be used with their debit cards!
For the low, low price of the transaction fee and all data about the transaction!
Is there a system in the US that doesn’t need an overhaul at this point?
There’s no transaction fees and the payment data can be anything you’d like… But I’m on the same page about an overhaul for sure
Considering I’ve been sending everyone to Session instead, since I refuse to put a phone number linked to my name, address, and payment information in to a “privacy focused” messenger…
They already lost users in authoritarian countries like Russia or China, where Signal is blocked and you can’t get an SMS via a VPN, so registration or logging in with 2FA becomes impossible.
Will this allow people to install it on multiple devices? Right now I can’t have it on my phone AND tablet and it sucks…
Check out a fork named Molly.
Not my experience:
- Signal (Android) on my phone
- alternative client (SfOS) on the same phone
- Signal desktop on my Linux laptop
All work with the same number/registration, i.e. they’re in sync.
While I don’t use it because of privacy concerns over the number I have it installed, and configured to recieve messages from people who insit on it.
I have it on my phone, and linked to Desktop via the native Linux port, but if I log in to my table it logs me out of my phone.
Then you probably registered your tablet to the phone number instead of setting it up as a secondary device.
Quiter possibly, it’s the same phone app on the tablet, so it does kinda push you toward that.
Never really saw the point of bothering, though, since Session worked perfectly on all devices without trying to figure out how to set the app as a secondary device since it uses the same key per account and putting in the recovery code adds a new device no matter which app or OS you’re on.
I’m on beta (testflight) on IOS and the latest version now allows adding a second phone. But I think previously you could already link an iPad or a laptop.
It would be good if true, for a privacy first chat, asking for your phone number is the first and biggest red flag.
Someone knows how Delta Chat handles the spam problem? Or spam is only a problem that comes with wider adoption?
I have no idea if this is true or not. But I heard the government has an app called “Pegasus 2”that can read all of your signal messages as long as they know your phone number.
The opnly confirmed thing I have heard is that they can read signal messages via your notifications, if they are enabled, so always check the app manually and do not use their push service.
While the capabilities of Pegasus may vary over time due to software updates, Pegasus is generally capable of reading text messages, call snooping, collecting passwords, location tracking, accessing the target device’s microphone and camera, and harvesting information from apps.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pegasus_(spyware)
Once installed, Pegasus has been reported to be able to run arbitrary code, extract contacts, call logs, messages, photos, web browsing history, settings, as well as gather information from apps including but not limited to communications apps iMessage, Gmail, Viber, Facebook, WhatsApp, Telegram, and Skype.
“Once installed” is operative here. Pegasus isnt a magic wand that you can swish to read all text messages on every phone. It needs to be deployed.
“Once installed” is operative here. Pegasus isnt a magic wand that you can swish to read all text messages on every phone. It needs to be deployed.
indeed, unless you’re a target for a state or a company that cares to spend money to spy on you, you don’t need to worry about pegasus
If your phone has been compromised, nothing is safe. That’s not a signal problem.
Throw the phone away and get another one.
You can never be sure if your phone has been compromised or not…. Hell, after the patriot act, how can you feel safe?
Like I said, that has nothing to do with signal or how secure it is.
In theory everything is possible because only Apple/Google+OEMs are running root on your device.
Haven’t they been working on this for months? I could have sworn I heard of this well over a year ago.
