Hotmail forcing users to provide phone # "for your protection..."

[PatColo]

Is everyone else with a hotmail acct or two getting nagged for this when they login? Or are they rolling it out in segments, to test the resistance factor? I've been hitting the "Not Now..." button and proceeding to my inbox. But they're being a bit aggressive the past 3-4 days, warning that I've only got 3...2...1 more day to provide this info. I'm now on my "LAST DAY...:o"

They were doing something similar a few months ago- logging in would go to a nag screen to provide, IIRC, an alt email addy, and/or a phone #, always on the "to help protect your account" pretense. There'd be 2-3 fields to complete, and only a "Submit" button, no "No Thanks" option. So I'd always just leave everything blank and hit Submit. It would return to the same nag screen again, and I'd just hit Submit again, and then it would give up and go to my inbox. Then that whole nag-for-further-data-mining-info campaign mercifully ended a couple months ago. But now it's this more aggressive nonsense.

Question: if I/we just give a fake #, is it next going to want to SMS/text a code to that # so they can verify it's our real # (under some other bogus 'for your protection' pretense of course)? Or does it just accept anything, and from our perspective that # would act like a backup password?

As Katherine Albrecht (http://gold-silver.us/forum/showthread.php?59965-SPYCHIPS-%28RFID%29......-the-free-E-book) points out, the "data-mining-value" of a "free" email acct is about $5/month to the providing company (MSN, Y!, GOOG etc)-- so my inclination remains to balk at their "demands"....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fleEOrMK-Ps

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fleEOrMK-Ps

[Twisted Titan]

Not for hotmail

But any dealings that i have that resquest a phone number

I give a old number that got disconnected years ago.


Seems to work thus far.

[osoab]

You on the outlook or on the old hotmail?

[PatColo]

Y'all remember when goog rolled out Gmail in what, around '05? They did it "right", from a Machiavellian data-miniing-info-grab perspective.

The details escape me, but IIRC they engineered a sort of an "in with the in-crowd" (web-saavy, mobile phone swinging, digital'ed-out) feel of "exclusivity" about it. It seems to get a Gmail acct, you needed an 'invitation' from a current Gmail-er (establishing that personal association for the goog). OR, if you wanted one anyways, to sign up you needed to give them your mobile #, to which they would text your code to proceed; and gawd only knows what other personal data-mining info they required of all parties.

But for awhile at least, that @gmail.com addy had a certain "I'm a playuh" panache to it... like today's "my facebook friends list is bigger than yours!" thing. I always turned up my nose to the goog (& NSAbook) bait, thankfully.... didn't like the odor. :(

[General of Darkness]

Not just them, but xbox, everyone. I think the book 1984 is their playbook, let's data mine and record everything. Because they know the way the world works right now is not natural.

You can't keep creating their form of wealth for eternity. It would be different if we still had an industrial base to where we had something to bargain with in a free market. But other than our military, we've got two things to bargain with Jack and Shit and Jack left town.

Why do you people think that survealance and security is in such high demand, why are they pushing gun control because they know what they've done.

Why is it that some jew from russian that was in the KGB that manages to steal the oil rights in russia now drives around in a 100 million dollar yacht? The chicken hawks run the roost.

All the best everyone.

[PatColo]

You on the outlook or on the old hotmail?

I guess it would be outlook. Can't remember the details of when/how that happened; I'm sure if I "okayed" it at some point, it was coz they made it appear compulsory. All I still use it for is the email.

This is just one of my anon/throwaway email addys, but I've had it since around... '99 I think? Now that I'm on my "LAST DAY..." with it, I think I'll need to go back though it, copy anything of value into a notepad doc, then nuke the In/Sent boxes, change the PW to something insane, and let them have it back.

Any reco's on a relatively nag-free email provider? Not MSN/Y!/GOOG of course.

[osoab]

I guess it would be outlook. Can't remember the details of when/how that happened; I'm sure if I "okayed" it at some point, it was coz they made it appear compulsory. All I still use it for is the email.

This is just one of my anon/throwaway email addys, but I've had it since around... '99 I think? Now that I'm on my "LAST DAY..." with it, I think I'll need to go back though it, copy anything of value into a notepad doc, then nuke the In/Sent boxes, change the PW to something insane, and let them have it back.

Any reco's on a relatively nag-free email provider? Not MSN/Y!/GOOG of course.

Try refreshing the login and re-enter your stuff.

[Publico]

That happened to me yesterday on Yahoo email. It wanted a mobile number. I was trying to set up an mail account for a woman I know who just retired and needed an email for Social Security. I tried to put in the 555-1212 number. It knew it was not a valid number. Then when I put in a made up number it said I would receive a text with some code number to put in to the first email the account received. I bugged out.

(In case somebody doesn't know: 555-1212 is the local "out of area" directory assistance. Dial the area code with the 555-1212 and you get that local directory assistance for the area code.)

[Norweger]

in the future i expect us to have one id for all logins etc... your online id. We can see some of that crap happening already with youtube/google.

[Down1]

I just gave them an email addy instead.

[PatColo]

Question: if I/we just give a fake #, is it next going to want to SMS/text a code to that # so they can verify it's our real # (under some other bogus 'for your protection' pretense of course)? Or does it just accept anything, and from our perspective that # would act like a backup password?

well hotmail's patience with me has finally come to an end today, it seems. Re the above question, I notice the answer lies right there in the hotmail nag (coerce) screen:


Help us protect your account


Passwords can be forgotten or stolen. Just in case, add security info now to help you get back into your account if something goes wrong. We won't use this info to spam you—just to keep your account more secure. Learn more. (http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=281820)
What security info would you like to add?

[Phone # or Email addy]
[country code for phone]
(XXX) XXX-XXXX

Verify phone via: Text ... Call
[or for email]
We'll send a security code to your alternate email address in the next step.



so I gave them another anon/throwaway yahoo email addy. It's not news to them; that same Y! email forced me to give an alt email some time back, and I gave them this hotmail addy in question, which Y! then sent a verification to, which MSN/hotmail then no doubt scanned & made note of.

again, any reco's on a data-mining-hassle-free, free email provider? One which makes their $ the old fashioned way: banner ads which no one clicks except by accident? I'd like to let this hotmail acct wither on the vine, and assume a new main anon addy.
OO)~

[Ares]

well hotmail's patience with me has come to an end today, it seems. Re the above question, I notice the answer lies right there in the hotmail nag (coerce) screen:



so I gave them another anon/throwaway yahoo email addy. It's not news to them; that same Y! email forced me to give an alt email some time back, and I gave them this hotmail addy in question, which Y! then sent a verification to, which MSN/hotmail then no doubt scanned & made note of.

again, any reco's on a data-mining-hassle-free, free email provider? One which makes their $ the old fashioned way: banner ads which no one clicks except by accident? I'd like to let this hotmail acct wither on the vine, and assume a new main anon addy.
OO)~

You know, I've been seriously entertaining setting up my own mail server just because of bullshit like this. All of the main ones hassle you for privacy shit anymore. All of the info I've given them is fake. From phone numbers to email addresses to physical addresses.

My favorite email address to use is InYourWife@yourhouse.com

Phone numbers (818)515-7890

The only other email provider that I use that does even ask for identifying information is tormail. Pick your login name and password and that's it.

[Cebu_4_2]

My wife got a new cell phone, the old one is gone. She couldn't get into her yahoo account because we moved to a new IP. ONLY option was to send a text to her registered cell # which was gone. So much for having the same email account for many years and her business. Absolutely no way to get into it, her secret answers will not work from a difft IP. I experienced the same anomaly with the secret answer shit that wouldn't work and had to eventually succumb to a text. I usually use an email connected to my website but there are times that a yahoo account would be preferable due to spam reasons.

[PatColo]

Y! Mail users: are you hating the new interface as much as me? I hadn't logged in there for over a week, not sure what day they pulled the trigger, but it's... umm, designed by the obamacare site makers? The little picture-buttons don't load for me, I just get a bunch of little abstract codes where they should be, and thankfully if I mouse-over them, a popup says what that button does. Replying, forwarding, I don't even want to try to describe that hell!

I guess I'll poke around & try to figure out if/where there's an option to stick with their last interface! :(

[Son-of-Liberty]

Just close your hotmail or email accounts Pat.

Checkout hushmail or pay a few bucks for your own domain and email. Costs like 10 bucks a year

[Ares]

Y! Mail users: are you hating the new interface as much as me? I hadn't logged in there for over a week, not sure what day they pulled the trigger, but it's... umm, designed by the obamacare site makers? The little picture-buttons don't load for me, I just get a bunch of little abstract codes where they should be, and thankfully if I mouse-over them, a popup says what that button does. Replying, forwarding, I don't even want to try to describe that hell!

I guess I'll poke around & try to figure out if/where there's an option to stick with their last interface! :(

You can change the theme and get rid of the message grouping.

You can thank Marissa Mayer (new CEO of Yahoo) as she assisted with the development and design aspects of gmail. Which Yahoo now resembles.

[gunDriller]

Not for hotmail

But any dealings that i have that resquest a phone number

I give a old number that got disconnected years ago.


that's a good start.

but it sounds like it could still be connected to you, if you are trying to be anonymous.


i think just giving this surveillance machine what they want - personal data, and lots of it - yes that makes sense.

doesn't have to be accurate data though !


just as Israel & probably the US gov. have acknowledged creating sock puppets to manipulate social media, perhaps we can 'fight' back by creating LOTS of surveillance data, and giving it to them.

no accuracy guarantees, though :)


on the other hand, the Jew-S gov. doesn't have any functional accuracy guarantees, either.

call it even ?

[PatColo]

Yahoo mail in recent... at least 6 months, has been nagging maybe every 2-3 logins, to provide them with more alt-contact data mining info, "for YOUR acct's PROTECTION! :o"; but to their credit there was always a tiny font "Skip for now" link below their pitch for greater info disclosure, which would take you straight to your inbox. Well past few days their pitch has become a bit more aggressive,



Help us keep your account safe

Recently, there's been a rise in security incidents on the web. While we continue to work hard to keep Yahoo's network secure,
we're asking users to help us keep their accounts safe.
Continue




Notice, no more Mr. "Skip for now" Nice Guy! :( It was only through my own extraordinary cleverness ;D that I entered 'mail.yahoo.com' in the address field, and it went to my inbox. :) Kind of an unadvertised back door in, which almost no one would think to try... instead being coerced/deceived-by-omission into coughing up more personal contact/social-media/etc info for Y!'s sneaky data mining efforts. :rolleyes:

[Cebu_4_2]

Notice, no more Mr. "Skip for now" Nice Guy! :( It was only through my own extraordinary cleverness ;D that I entered 'mail.yahoo.com' in the address field, and it went to my inbox. :) Kind of an unadvertised back door in, which almost no one would think to try... instead being coerced/deceived-by-omission into coughing up more personal contact/social-media/etc info for Y!'s sneaky data mining efforts. :rolleyes:

I allways use mail.yahoo.com, then I have choices saved in firefox which email account I want to go to. I did put an alternative email and cell# for text because if they block you say from a different IP you can access the account. Been there done that. I don't use my cell anyways but if I need to get into my email I have an option rather than lose that account.

[PatColo]

I need to setup (another) anon email with Iceland based http://unseen.is (http://unseen.is/) which seems to be a pretty privacy conscious, anti-big-bro em provider; and use it for nothing but a stock answer for these free em providers' nags to "help me protect my acct" by giving them more & more personal data mining info; and tell Y! to use it. Who knows when I'll get locked out of that Y! Mail account for good, or at a critical time like a week ago when I came into an airport and used a rental comp there to log into my Y! Mail acct... to be met with a Y! "security" screen saying they hadn't seen me log in via that device/IP before, and despite my having properly entered my username and very difficult pw, Y! insisted on an extra security measure of sending me a code to either 1) a long since abandoned hotmail acct (same one which prompted this thread....), or 2) to a mobile # I'd given them a couple years ago-- a willing friend's # coz I didn't have a mobile # to use. Because of Y! Mail's hyper-vigilence in "protecting me"; I was effectively locked out of my acct (at that time... I didn't think to try the mail.yahoo.com seekrit back door at that time)~! :( Then tried later at a different (but also "new to Y!") comp, and it went to my inbox without hassle. :) But then past 2-3 days, the increasingly desparate Y! nags as described in my reply 18 above. :(

[Cebu_4_2]

Get an obama cell and fake email like you mentioned. Getting locked out only occurs when you despirately need it. I use my business account for 99.9% of my email and yahoo as a backup for things I don't want spammed to my biz. The Biz account is not easy to setup like anon yahoo on any machine.

[PatColo]

fwiw, I was able to open a "free 7 day trial" http://startmail.com acct; and from that I was able to open a new http://unseen.is account... each acct using the other as its alt-email answer. So 2 brand new functioning em accts, ref'ing no pre-existing accts. Trick is, u need to begin with the startmail trial acct which doesn't require alt-em or phone/SMS verification. They do strongly advise an alt-em for lost pw recovery, but ultimately they don't require it-- your trial acct will work regardless of whether you provide alt-em. Then I found that unseen.is DOES insist on an alt-em, so I used my new/temp startmail addy for that, and now have a functioning unseen.is addy as well, which won't turn into a pumpkin after 7 days and I can use it for present & future alt-em nags.

Using the new unseen.is addy to open a new gmail acct; I ran into their now requiring BOTH alt-em & mobile/SMS verification to open. Around 2 years ago I recall opening a new gmail, and they were satisfied with only an alt-em... you could continue past the mobile/SMS and still open a functioning account... but no more. :(

Any time a "free em" like gmail, Y!, hotmail etc insist upon alt-em and/or mobile/SMS verification; when they can more effectively "help you in case you lose your pw" via a secret question & answer (granny's hometown, first pet's name, high school mascot, etc)-- they're lying (by omission)... they only want these personal items from you for (spook agency...) data mining & dossier building. :(

[monty]

You might look into proton mail.

ProtonMail (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ProtonMail)
ProtonMail is a free and web-based encrypted email service founded in 2013 at the CERN research facility by Jason Stockman, Andy Yen and Wei Sun. ProtonMail is…

They have a waiting list for an available mailbox and ask for a small donation.

[Joshua01]

mail.com


Easy, free and no personal information is required