> The technology that powers SSB is entirely different from Twitter and Mastodon. You don’t need to register an account anywhere to get started. Your identity isn’t a username and doesn’t depend on a domain name or service provider. Instead, your username is a meaningless cryptographic hash that consists of random-looking numbers and letters. Your friends only need to know your hash to follow you, and you can keep it as public or private as you want.

I'm not familiar with SSB. And, to me, this article's headline is five words too long (harumph)

Question though: Does this imply that I can follow someone without them knowing about it if their address hash gets leaked? If so, in what way could it meaningfully be described as being private? I assume there's some way to control who you broadcast to, or approve someone who follows you, and this description is just not mentioning it.