oof yeah :| Twilio has pretty much made half a business model out of promising that you can refuse VoIP numbers using their APIs soo it’s a real thing

honestly, this responses just pisses me off.

not everyone who needs to be careful with their privacy is fortunate to have a stockpile of money to spend on carriers that are WAY more expensive than they need to be. or reliable internet access.

i understand that you may not have an answer to the original question of “how do I <x>?”, and you have the opportunity to avoid the situation in the whole and not have to think about it – that’s pretty awesome! but it completely ignores the fact that everyone is in a different situation, with specific and unique needs and context. it reeks of being patronizing tbh.

we don’t know what this person’s situation is, so the thing to do here is to take them at their word and help them with the problem in front of us. suggestions towards alternative solutions are of course welcome, but things like “not sure why youd want to do that” only serves to show that you don’t understand the situation.

not everyone has the same choices available to them in their situations, everyone’s threat model is different.

and when you need a real, non-VoIP, number for something, wifi helps out how…?

there’s a couple places it’s the only feasible option, especially if you have other limitations such as needing an esim etc

in my opinion, it’s up to you. there shouldn’t really be a strict definition, since everyone’s needs and starting point is different. don’t worry so much about trying to live up to a particular standard and figure out what level and methods of disengaging from Google (or any other tech company) works best for you.

(edit: autocorrect fix)

it would help to know jurisdiction/market area because that really affects the options, especially because that’s a rapidly changing landscape right now. some places, prepaid SIMs + cash work well enough, other places it’s better to go with giftcards or prepaid debit cards etc. yet other places there’s definitely no good options to do it. it takes a lot of effort, and you have to remember that you need to consider that any app or service you log into on that phone may end up identifying you against the SIM card, so you need to be really careful in your usage! i hope you find an option that works! :)

never forget that even the tor project had a relationship with Team Cymru that everyone likes to pretend was just a normal thing for them to do… Team Cymru is kiinda creepy