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cross-posted from: https://hexbear.net/post/6782495

i've already posted this on reddit (in r/discordapp, but the subreddit removed it for "violating the rules of the subreddit"). that said, yesterday, because i've been friending people at a very fast rate, discord thought my account is being automated and locked out my account - the way i have to unlock it is by verifying with a phone number.

i think email verification is good, but vertifying with a phone number without permission counts as coercion which (as a left-libertarian) goes against the non-aggression principle (DON'T use force or coercion on anyone). that's why i think phone numbers should be taken off the verification process on discord.

i also think email verification should be encouraged more. seriously!

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[-] PorkrollPosadist@hexbear.net 6 points 3 weeks ago

Any company on the Internet asking for your phone number is Mossad.

[-] DylanMc6@hexbear.net 0 points 3 weeks ago
[-] PorkrollPosadist@hexbear.net 8 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

I'm being facetious, but the reason they do this is to lock down your identity. If they have your phone number they might as well have your social security number. Okay, a phone number is a little bit easier to change, but it is still on record as belonging to you at your bank, your workplace, your landlord, your cable / internet / wireless providers, the state itself. It is also likely known by any major social media company any of your acquaintances have used, as well as the entire data harvesting and ad profile-building industry. It is a very sensitive piece of personally identifying information that can be used to track you and dredge up even more of your personal information in all sorts of places. It's a primary key in every mass-surveillance database ever constructed.

If a chat app requires you to provide a phone number, they have a substantial disdain for your privacy, and a disdain for online anonymity in general. They are trying to build a profile on you. They are trying to get an idea of your social reach, your physical location, the amount of disposable income you have, a list of services you are subscribed to, etc. They are buying and selling this information with third parties. Signal, Telegram, and Whatsapp all have the same problem. On the surface, they do this for two reasons. The downright sleazy ones like Facebook will beg every user to slurp down their whole address book to "help connect you with people you know." This is obviously completely self-serving on their end. The less sleazy ones see phone numbers and government IDs as a means of mitigating bot accounts, but this is just a more believable PR smokescreen for the same thing. And hell, it could be useful. If I wanted to use my phone number as a method to recover my account in case I lose my password, I wouldn't mind the option, but the requirement is just fucking surveillance.

[-] DylanMc6@hexbear.net 0 points 3 weeks ago

can surveillance (in a form of asking for a phone number for discord verification) count as an example of coercion (as per the non-aggression principle - DON'T use force or coercion on anyone)?

[-] PorkrollPosadist@hexbear.net 6 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

I don't think this practice violates the NAP under a traditional libertarian point of view, but it certainly is an example of coercion. I don't find the non-aggression principle particularly useful (like, ever, really). In this case, it's too easy of an excuse to say nobody is forcing you to use Discord (et. al), and they have a right to set their own terms of service. You could say no and take your "business" elsewhere. Under a libertarian framework, Discord has just as much of a right to do as they wish as you do.

The problem with the non-aggression principle is that it kind of assumes that everyone is a peer. It doesn't consider systemic or economic power at all really. It externalizes scarcity and says as long as I don't personally harm you, I can sit on my horde of bread while you starve and YOU would be at fault if you tried to do anything about it other than enter into some sort of contract with me where I hold all the leverage. It exists in an idealistic world where if one is not happy with a company or institution, they can frictionlessly create a superior alternative, or that one will materialize out of the ether due to market forces. Instead of considering that maybe such firms and institutions should be coerced to serve a public good instead of playing this market game where billions of people vote with their feet change social media platforms every week, every time one of them changes their privacy policy.

These companies take advantage of their monopoly power to impose their will upon and exploit their users. While social media companies aren't exclusive monopolies in the sense of the Bell Telephone Company, there is only one place you can go to participate in "Celestecord" or the Kerbal Space Program Realistic Progression Mod chat, or countless other examples. These companies know this. They know they can use the threat of cutting you off from you friends / community to force you to hand over information that you wouldn't surrender voluntarily. They know they can use this power to crack down on anybody reverse-engineering the protocol and creating third-party clients with fewer built-in surveillance and advertising features, or to prohibit people from implementing enhanced security features like end-to-end encryption.

[-] DylanMc6@hexbear.net 2 points 3 weeks ago
  1. as a left-libertarian, i think the non-aggression principle (used often by conservative libertarians) should be rewritten into simply "DON'T use force or coercion on anyone - save the force for self-defense". the part about property in the nap should be removed, as i think property should be tenant-owned and put in a land value tax. seriously!

  2. if only someone made a third-party client that bypasses the verification stuff and DIDN'T get cracked down by discord. seriously!

[-] DylanMc6@hexbear.net 1 points 3 weeks ago

if only someone made a third-party client that bypasses the verification stuff and DIDN'T get cracked down by discord. seriously!

[-] DylanMc6@hexbear.net 1 points 3 weeks ago

as a left-libertarian, i think the non-aggression principle (used often by conservative libertarians) should be rewritten into simply "DON'T use force or coercion on anyone - save the force for self-defense". seriously!

this post was submitted on 18 Nov 2025
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