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Comment by smichel17 | Hacker News Reader

When I deleted my account, I went through one additional step:

6. Delete your account. Create a new account under a pseudonym. Add a single friend, who can add you to group chats.

At this point, you should have a near-empty news feed; Facebook is only for staying in touch with the group (eg, not missing out on social events) until people have gotten used to texting you to invite you to things.

You won't be able to comment on anything public because if your account gets reported as a fake, you'll be locked out of the account unless you provide ID (which of course you can't do, since it's not your real name).

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>Create a new account under a pseudonym.

I've not been on Facebook for years, and I tried doing this recently. It was relentless in pestering me for a phone number for "security reasons". It would not accept any of the online SMS services I found. I ended up abandoning it.

Sounds like a job for a burner phone.

Yes, but there's no way I'm investing neither money nor time in jumping through silly Facebook hoops. What's to stop them from suddenly requiring dental x-rays, or some other nonsense, for "security reasons"?

Why would someone buy a whole new phone just to use a shitty advertising network they explicitly did not want to use?

Who said anything about a phone? Prepaid SIM cards are free, top one up with £5 and you're good to go.

> Sounds like a job for a burner phone.

I mean it's right there...

Right, but the "phone" part of a burner phone is essentially superfluous, it's the sim card that serves the purpose here. Of course you need to put it into something but it doesn't matter what. You can swap your main sim card with a "burner" sim, get the code to authenticate, then swap back. It takes 2 minutes.

Because due to network effects they effectively have to use it.

Even if you take it literally as a physical phone instead of SIM, the SMS verification works equally well with 20 EUR Nokia dumbphone as with the latest iPhone.

You can get a free SIM, but even if you have to pay 5$ or whatever... many people still need to use facebook messenger to get in touch with some people, for instance.

and then what, run the spyware on my main phone, so it can have all of my data and my friends data?

m.facebook.com for the social network

mbasic.facebook.com for chat

No apps needed

Nope, that won't work. Facebook will ask you for a phone number and for a selfie. It will then match both against their databases, and ask you for an ID if there is none.

You can get a "burner" phone number and even a physical phone (that's what I do for whatsapp), but you can't have a burner face to make selfies.

...so now I don't have a FB account at all, and it is very inconvenient.

Since when? I've never been asked for a selfie.

If you must, it doesn't seem like a big problem still. Go to thispersondoesnotexist.com, hit F5 a few times to find a nice portrait, then Google "driver license template" and apply basic Photoshop skills.

It probably means you're using your real name and/or your real phone number. Or have an established account with photos of you.

I did not check if images from thispersondoesnotexist.com would work to pass the selfie check, but my guess is that they wouldn't. A professional portrait of someone from a Western country who has never been seen on any photos Facebook owns, not even in the background? That's a red flag. Also, my guess is that Facebook knows about that page and takes precautions.

Anyway, if Facebook tries that hard to make sure I'm not there, why should I join?

I'm using a psuedonym but my real phone number. I don't see what they would compare it to though. It might as well just be a burner phone.

I do not believe they check it; if you provide an ID scan, it's good enough.

Because you have no choice but to join.

You can try using a picture from https://www.thispersondoesnotexist.com/.

If a lot of people do that, then maybe Facebook moves to requiring pictures with a code written on them, like Reddit does.

>Nope, that won't work. Facebook will ask you for a phone number and for a selfie. It will then match both against their databases, and ask you for an ID if there is none.

Damn, I never would have made a Facebook account if that was what the sign up process was when I signed up. That's just fucking insane. How the hell did it get to that point?

Bookmark the groups you want to periodically check.

Stay away from the newsfeed on the home page, no distraction and no mindless scrolling.

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