[ttybird2]

"especially since google regularly warns you during login that this can happen if you don't add your number"

All of this is so that they can mine phone numbers for older accounts. Now they require a phone number by default.

It makes sense to add a way to recover access to your account if you fear that you may forget your password. It makes no sense to give google your phone number just in case they may out of nowhere decide that you look suspicious (for using firefox? moving to another country? something else?) and reject authenticating you despite being able to enter your password correctly.

"you should not have used their service for your whole life's activities anyway"

You should not do that in general as Google is extremely unreliable. I had given them my phone number for my account but this did not help. I posted about it at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30544030 a few months ago.

[tzs]

> It makes sense to add a way to recover access to your account if you fear that you may forget your password. It makes no sense to give google your phone number just in case they may out of nowhere decide that you look suspicious (for using firefox? moving to another country? something else?) and reject authenticating you despite being able to enter your password correctly.

Why should the reason you need to recover the account matter?

If the account is important to you, wouldn't losing it be equally bad regardless of whether you lost it because you forgot your password or you lost it because Google did something annoying?

[ttybird2]

I meant in terms of what google may need to prove that it is you.

[j4tech]

I was NEVER prompted for a phone number or given a warning that I will not be able to access my account if I didnt have one. (Maybe because i already had one on the account and removed it?. Not sure). However, off and on , google would prompt me for my recovery email and I had no problem accessing my account using that.