[tor-talk] registration for youtube, gmail over Tor - fake voicemail / sms anyone?

[Abel Luck]

Mike Hearn:
> We blacklist SMS/voice forwarding services when we find them and
> re-suspend the accounts that used them. We haven't focused on it much
> so there are certainly services we haven't blacklisted yet.
> 
> Generally, using these services is dangerous. If spammers have used
> the same numbers you get allocated to bypass verification, you can be
> treated as part of the cluster and have your account terminated
> without appeal.
> 
> I don't see the distinction between "pay somebody to create an account
> for you" and "buy an account". Both types of activity are likely to
> hit various tripwires that will result in forced phone verification of
> the account later on. Bear in mind it's not just at signup. If we
> suspect an account is being used abusively then the account can be
> locked until you pass SMS too.
> 
> Right now I don't believe there is any safe way to use Google accounts
> via Tor if you aren't willing to provide a phone number, nor do I
> believe it's safe for any other large web service. Handling abuse
> whilst allowing discardable identities is a fundamental research
> problem the Tor team need to solve if they don't want Tor to be
> restricted to a "read only" internet (to use Greg Maxwells phrasing).
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Thanks for the frank and upfront information Mike. It's refreshing :)