Google Shared My Phone Number!
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The author suggests it was added through people answering the "is this a business" prompts on their phones, not the identity verification.
So, all you have to do to "out" anyone who ever talks to you on the phone is mis-inform Google that the number is a business and "boom" they're out there.
Makes one want to start using callerID spoofing as a regular practice. I am calling from 212-555-1212.
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"Some years ago, I provided my phone number to Google as part of an identity verification process, but didn’t consent to it being shared publicly."
That may have been the case at the time, but Google have a bad habit of updating legal documents and settings from time to time. Even if you didn't consent to it directly, you may have agreed to a contract you didn't read, which resulted in Google doing everything permitted in that contract. Chances are, the contract says that Google can legally screw around as much as they like, and you're powerless to do anything about it.
And such contracts are legally unenforceable, if you've got the resources to sue.
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So, all you have to do to "out" anyone who ever talks to you on the phone is mis-inform Google that the number is a business and "boom" they're out there.
Makes one want to start using callerID spoofing as a regular practice. I am calling from 212-555-1212.
What do you mean "out" them?
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What do you mean "out" them?
Get their phone number published on the open internet.
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Get their phone number published on the open internet.
If you wanted to do that, you could just edit it into a business listing directly, or even create one. If it's from the "was this a business" prompt, I expect it takes a bunch of people to say yes, not just one. (And if you get that prompt, Google associates your number with a business already.)
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I wonder if it’s possible to specifically exclude your business/website/project from google search. Surely that must be something you can legally do.
Sure, reach out to every website and human on the planet, read through each terms and conditions, and hire fewer than 8 billion lawyers to litigate if they don't. Easy peasy.
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I understand the story is about google adding a guy's number to a business profile, which seems very odd. But I wonder if anybody here is old enough to remember phone books? I haven't seen one in a while, but in the landline era the phone company used to automatically deliver one to everybody who had a phone. A large physical book with the name, address and phone number of everybody in the local area, except people who paid extra to be unlisted. If you didn't want to look somebody up in the book you could dial a number and a helpful operator would tell you their phone number so you could call them. This was totally normal and didn't bother anybody - how do people feel about that whole concept now?
It's like having 100,000 yellow pages books. In the days of old you might be able to switch cities if you were trying to evade a stalker. Now you'll have to change your name, face, and accent.
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If you wanted to do that, you could just edit it into a business listing directly, or even create one. If it's from the "was this a business" prompt, I expect it takes a bunch of people to say yes, not just one. (And if you get that prompt, Google associates your number with a business already.)
I expect it takes a bunch of people to say yes, not just one.
I expect the algorithm is a) not publicly published, and b) changes periodically - like to just require one click when a particular department needs to "make their numbers" by the end of the quarter.
you could just edit it into a business listing directly
I challenge you to find any "free and easy, one click" business listing that gets 0.1% of the visibility of a Google info business phone number.
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Yes, I remember these (they also send a map of the city with all the street and public transportation lines)
But the point is that you can be unlisted from these (and as far as I remember it was free). Not sure about the part where you can call an operator that tell you the number you are looking for.
Anyway, the problem is that Google seems to have shared the phone number even if the user declined to do so (and by the user account, the number was not listed for years). This just seems a move from Google that show a total disperect of the user decision.
The phone company definitely did charge extra for unlisted numbers. The number lookup service, which was just called "Information", was accessed by dialing 411 - the origin of "What's the 411?" In the olden days you got a human being, then they automated it with voice recognition. In most places 411 doesn't exist anymore but it was in service until only a few years ago.
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It's like having 100,000 yellow pages books. In the days of old you might be able to switch cities if you were trying to evade a stalker. Now you'll have to change your name, face, and accent.
You can still pay for lookup services. I got a 1-month subscription recently to contact the mom of a friend who disappeared. All I had was the guy's last name and the town he said his mom lived in. Cost 7 or 8 bucks but it was worth it. So anyway I imagine a stalker wouldn't need a ton of resources to track a person down using pay services.
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Google Shared My Phone Number!
When people started calling my personal mobile number with questions about a voluntary organisation I'm involved with, I was confused: we weren't sharing that number. It turns out that Google had decided to take the number I used to verify my identity for Google Business some years prior and start putting it in Google Search results. WTF, Google?
Dan Q (danq.me)
I think it's dodgy as well I'd been job searching and I guess I accidently linked Google somehow, so now the sites completely ignoring the details I gave it and insists on sending everything to my Gmail instead of Proton which I actually ditched Gmail for.
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This post did not contain any content.
Google Shared My Phone Number!
When people started calling my personal mobile number with questions about a voluntary organisation I'm involved with, I was confused: we weren't sharing that number. It turns out that Google had decided to take the number I used to verify my identity for Google Business some years prior and start putting it in Google Search results. WTF, Google?
Dan Q (danq.me)
I was really getting into that article, and then it just just suddenly ends. How anticlimactic. I was hoping the article writer was a bit more dedicated towards finding out why Google posted his personal number in the first place...
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You can still pay for lookup services. I got a 1-month subscription recently to contact the mom of a friend who disappeared. All I had was the guy's last name and the town he said his mom lived in. Cost 7 or 8 bucks but it was worth it. So anyway I imagine a stalker wouldn't need a ton of resources to track a person down using pay services.
If you know the town then in the old days you could go there and get a yellow pages. But your point is valid, because there's so many other privacy concerns this one is a drop in the bucket. I'm much more scared of the government watching me through my neighbor's ring cameras just because I said Luigi Mangione is innocent on Lemmy (which he totally is). Or that Elon Musk told us he's a Nazi sympathizer and I'm repeating what he said, neutrally.
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I wonder if it’s possible to specifically exclude your business/website/project from google search. Surely that must be something you can legally do.
If it's your personal info, you can ask for it here.
If it's your own website you want delisted, that's here.Now do the same for bing, ddg, startpage, yandex, yahoo, kagi, brave, ask, ecosia etc etc....
Which is to say, if it's on the internet and publicly accessible, assume it's permanent and going to be indexed at some point.
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This post did not contain any content.
Google Shared My Phone Number!
When people started calling my personal mobile number with questions about a voluntary organisation I'm involved with, I was confused: we weren't sharing that number. It turns out that Google had decided to take the number I used to verify my identity for Google Business some years prior and start putting it in Google Search results. WTF, Google?
Dan Q (danq.me)
Isn't it a function of Google Maps that anybody can submit changes to the business informations of a company listed there?
It's like a wiki where all registered uses can suggest contributions.
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This post did not contain any content.
Google Shared My Phone Number!
When people started calling my personal mobile number with questions about a voluntary organisation I'm involved with, I was confused: we weren't sharing that number. It turns out that Google had decided to take the number I used to verify my identity for Google Business some years prior and start putting it in Google Search results. WTF, Google?
Dan Q (danq.me)
anyone can make a google company profile. seems like clickbait.
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The phone company definitely did charge extra for unlisted numbers. The number lookup service, which was just called "Information", was accessed by dialing 411 - the origin of "What's the 411?" In the olden days you got a human being, then they automated it with voice recognition. In most places 411 doesn't exist anymore but it was in service until only a few years ago.
Wait, I suspect that we don't live in the same country.
In Italy keeping the number unlisted was free (you just needed to declare it when you were signing the contract) and I have no memory of something like the 411. -
In the US the "standard" low cost line was listed in the white pages by default, you effectively paid extra - per month - for an unlisted number.
The operator information was basically a phone company employee reading the white pages info to you, for a fee.
In the US the “standard” low cost line was listed in the white pages by default, you effectively paid extra - per month - for an unlisted number.
As far as I remember in Italy the situation was different.
You can ask to delist the number when you sign the contract and it was free. I am not really sure if in the case you decided later to delist the number you needed to pay a one time fee for that, but keeping delisted was always free. -
In the US the “standard” low cost line was listed in the white pages by default, you effectively paid extra - per month - for an unlisted number.
As far as I remember in Italy the situation was different.
You can ask to delist the number when you sign the contract and it was free. I am not really sure if in the case you decided later to delist the number you needed to pay a one time fee for that, but keeping delisted was always free.Italy, and all of Europe, have always had a greater respect for personal and a lesser respect for business' profits than the U.S.
