Privacy

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A place to discuss privacy and freedom in the digital world.

Privacy has become a very important issue in modern society, with companies and governments constantly abusing their power, more and more people are waking up to the importance of digital privacy.

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How I Got a Truly Anonymous Signal Account (theintercept.com)

submitted 4 months ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

44 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Yes, you can use Signal without sharing your personal phone number. Here’s how I did it.

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[–] [email protected] 58 points 4 months ago* (last edited 4 months ago) (12 children)

tl;dr the sms verification falls back to voice and they just used a payphone.

I guess if you count the airport full of cameras they went to to do this as "anonymous", then sure :)

Also this article from 2017 suggests not using this method:

It’s important to maintain control of this phone number. For example, you could use a disposable SMS service to register with Signal — there are many such services if you search for them — but those phone numbers can be used by anyone. Similarly, you should avoid using a public payphone’s number, or a SIM card on which you do not intend to renew service. If someone else can receive SMS messages or phone calls to this phone number, they can take your Signal account away from you.

[–] [email protected] 34 points 4 months ago (5 children)

That risk is not just theoretical. I made a test account (on another service; not Signal) using a free anonymous SMS number. A few months later, the account had been hijacked.

Of course, if it's a disposable account, then having it hijacked after you're done with it might be a good thing.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Signal has account pins now so I don't think the attack vector is as large as it used to be

[–] [email protected] 18 points 4 months ago (1 children)

They can't "take over" your account, but they can "override" it and delete yours.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 4 months ago (1 children)

How can they override it?

[–] [email protected] 8 points 4 months ago (1 children)

Register a new account over that phone number. They can't get into any previous accounts register with that phone number. They could potentially manage to find the pin if the previous user really used a guessable one, but then again, they won't be able to check the previous messages and the linked owner of that account will be warned of that new connection.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 4 months ago

I don't think that's possible with a registration lock unless you are inactive for longer than 7 days.

Enabling a registration lock triggers a 7-day inactivity timer if your number is registered on another device.

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