Twitter Drops Support For Two-Factor Authentication Texts Using Google Voice Numbers

In the past week, we saw Twitter drop support for Google’s voice number texts using 2FA technology.

The company says the change was first done last week and there really wasn’t any type of error text after a user added their details when signing into the app. Instead, users were left with a blank box located on the screen that failed to explain what exactly was taking place.

If you happened to be logged into another type of device, you could simply turn off this Text Message 2FA by entering the menu for settings. Simply click on security and then account access and 2FA.

Thanks to a number of reports put forward by the team, it’s quite clear how there’s a common link in such 2FA sign-ins that end up failing when you use Google Voice.

As a part of the test carried out today, you would notice how an effort made to re-enable voice numbers for 2FA would result in a number of errors including a message that says that such a number can’t be registered.

If you try to delete that number belonging to a certain account and begin to re-add, you’ll notice it won’t be registered and Twitter asks you to try and make use of email instead. But if you use the regular number of your carrier, the app does certainly better with such error texts.

In case you’re wondering why, well, Google Voice is no longer receiving support from Twitter 2FA as a part of the firm’s battle with bots seen across the platform. Twitter’s chief did mention in the past how it’s a huge focus at the moment and he even went about reporting that an initial attempt to get rid of spam had backfired in the end.

Instead of working to get rid of individual offenders, the firm was seen identifying certain mobile networks that had to do with huge spam in particular nations and even ended up blocking certain users too that relied on such networks from getting particular SMS through Twitter. And that meant it would affect people with this 2FA authentication. But we saw it block traffic from certain carriers completely.

Musk mentioned through a post on his account on the app how open he is about such matters and how there are so many telecommunication firms out there that aren’t being honest and instead choosing to game the system.


H/T: 9to5Google

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