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Comment by zeroer | Hacker News Reader

I change sim card (and hence phone number) frequently for international travel. WhatsApp is horrendous for this use case. It makes me re-authenticate (or something) each time, and people have a hard time finding me. Identity should not be linked to phone number.

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I do this often, too. Just FYI: all you need to do is tell WhatsApp "Never mind, I'm not actually changing my number" when prompted (which should only happen once per SIM card change). That's it. You'll continue being identified to your WhatsApp contacts by your "home" phone number (not your temporary one).

I don't have a home phone number.

I think from the fact that it was in quotes, "home" just means your default number

I don't have a default number.

You can see why I might think that forcing phone number to equal identify might be a bad idea.

I understand that I'm an unusual case, but I'm sure plenty of other people go through something similar this every couple years if and when they switch phone numbers or providers or move.

I have had the same mobile number for the past 20 years, throughout dozens of different phones and operators. This is very typical where I live (Southern Europe) where, in fact, WhatsApp is very popular.

Question: how do people you haven't been in contact with manage to find you, if you change your number every 2 years?

In the past three years, I haven't spent more than 60 cumulative days in a single country. Keeping a single phone number is a nonstarter for me.

People contact me via email. Apple's iMessage is the only chat client I've been able to use effectively, because they tie identity to email, not phone number.

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