Google is now self-Verifying Phone Number without user CONSENT

[u/Nanosinx]

WARNING: Google Play Services is quietly "Self-Verifying" and linking your phone number to ALL signed-in accounts without explicit permission.

Just a heads up for anyone who values basic privacy on Android.

Check your inbox for emails from noreply-phone-verification@google.com.

Without asking for my confirmation or giving me an opt-in prompt, Google Play Services performed a silent background "Self-Verification."

It exchanged SIM card identifiers and device metadata with my mobile carrier, grabbed my phone number, and automatically attached it to EVERY Google account logged into my phone.

No prompt. No "Do you want to link this?" button. Just a silent background action followed by a notification email telling me it already happened.

How to kill this setting on Android immediately (for now) but it will self verify even if turned off Go to Settings > Google (or Google Services) > All Services > Phone Number Verification

Find Phone number verification (or Device Phone Number Verification). (Ah, and lovely it automatically appear my phone number even WHEN IT WAS NOT THERE BEFORE!)

TOGGLE IT OFF.

Don't forget to purge your accounts:

Once Google steals/verifies the number, it pushes it to your Google account profiles.

You need to log into myaccount.google.com/personal-info, click on Phone, and manually delete the number from every single account where you don't want it stored.

Modern "self-verification" dark patterns are completely out of hand. Check your settings before Google silently grabs your data too.

NO ANDROID IS SAFE: Happened on my Android 10 Huawei, Android 14 Xiaomi and is now requesting on my emulators too...even my tablet... Beware...

Edit1: Maybe dont work, i sent a mail to data-protection-office@google.com, literally asking ARCO rights and anything i can think about it, for such privacy invasion on the behalf of my and all accounts i have to "care" and so on...maybe this bring pressure

Edit2: u/AppleBites reports this "Google did the same to me when I got a 2nd number from another carrier, due to coverage. Even having GrapheneOS did not prevent them from linking the number to my Google account automatically."

Meaning even Graphene OS+GServices probably is unable to protect with this, a serious oversteeping in this messed thing

[u/Throwitaway701]

This is deeply painful when it's a new SIM card and a that requires porting,

[u/degggendorf → u/Throwitaway701]

Why?

[u/3hb3 → u/degggendorf]

new SIM that requires porting will have a random "temporary number" active on it initially
I'd imagine the pain point would be Google automatically attaching this number to your account, when you'd only ever use that number once, for maybe 5-10 minutes.

[u/degggendorf → u/3hb3]

Why is that a problem? It's a good thing that Google captures your number and device info, because that will allow them to block someone else spoofing your info.

Try switching your MFA to use that new temporary number and not your established permanent number and see how it goes.

[u/3hb3 → u/degggendorf]

Try switching your MFA to use that new temporary number and not your established permanent number and see how it goes.

Yeah, that's what I'm saying. That's where a potential pain point could be.

[u/degggendorf → u/3hb3]

Isn't the google data helping ease that pain point? If it's the same hardware footprint that has hosted both confirmed numbers, then google has higher confidence that it's legitimate than if it's a brand new number trying to confirm your account that google knows nothing else about.

[u/nathderbyshire → u/3hb3]

I use esims and that hasn't happened on mine, I can see the gibberish number under the SIM section for my second esims but it isn't used in verification and the actual number is toggled off, only my main number is being used