How do you manage keeping your phone number private

spiral

Really great info, thanks!

spiral

Have you used silent.link ? If so, can you share your opinion of it?

N1b

spiral yes I use one silent.link data eSIM, it is working as expected. When crossing borders I sometimes have to change roaming profiles with the SIM Toolkit app, but other than that I get good reception and can choose the network provider which is great since depending on where I am, there is a noticeable difference in reliability of each network.

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greendesk I do not. I try and use my JMP.chat number where I can, but only because they're more reliable than regular SIM, especially in any kind of roaming setting, not because of some 'privacy' angle.

I use eSIM as my regular number that people know. It's not public or anything, but for all intents are purposes it might be as @N1b remarked.

The rest are just single or multi-use nano SIMs I use for what is mostly just data. Some are no KYC PAYG, some (especially when traveling) required blood and stool sample to be issued and forever contaminated my ostensibly clean IMEI. All in all, not a great situation.

applesbana

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For future reference (or others), silent link can be a good way to avoid kyc SIM card purchasing in foreign countries, also I recently used airalo and it worked great for me

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applesbana I know of them, I even checked out a podcast episode with the founder, but came away unconvinced this is something I need. Additionally, one of the benefits of 'local' SIMs is that their numbers are picked up by said locals. No landlady in Bangkok is picking up calls with Fairfax, South Carolina area code.

applesbana

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Good point about having a local number. I didn’t run into that issue in South America bur could see it happening. But I like the convenience of landing and having a working esim without needing to give me passport over to get a sim

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applesbana But I like the convenience of landing and having a working esim without needing to give me passport over to get a sim

Yeah that's nice I agree. I've looked into hodgepodge of different 'international SIMs', but haven't really found anything I would be excited to use. Also, and not hijack the thread (which we already achieved to do anyway), I find silent.link website copy to be really sleazy. It's part of the reason they didn't click for me, albeit maybe a silly one.

[deleted]

[deleted] That said, it's nice to know people in this community find them to be a good value prop.

Skyway

Kind of off topic.
One way to keep your number from being spammed or shared is simply don't answer if you don't know the number .
If its a spam call like trying to renew your auto warranty , once you answer they mark it as a good number to spam.
I use jmp.chat when I have to give a number out to unknown services.

Blastoidea

Can’t you only allow calls from folks who are in your contacts?

graphene32942

N1b How do you open the SIM Toolkit app to switch roaming profiles? Under Settings -> Apps -> See all apps -> SIM Toolkit, there's no button to open the app.

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graphene32942 https://github.com/GrapheneOS/os-issue-tracker/issues/2183#issuecomment-1538593593

N1b

graphene32942 I have that sometimes too, a restart helps in my case and I can open the app afterwards.

Murcielago

ve3jlg

Funny, my workaround is quite similar.

With the difference that I always display my number under menu>settings>calling accounts>cell provider>additional settings>caller ID> Number displayed in outgoing calls (fits my threat model).

For people and companies etc. to whom I do not want to display my number, I have prefixed a #31# in the phone book - this suppresses my number for these call recipients. If I spontaneously want to suppress my number for other calls, I copy paste the number and also prefix the respective call with #31#.

If you also display caller ID for calls from that contact, you need to add another contact number for them of type "other" which has the original, plain number without the prefix.

Smart - I adopted it straight away, thanks for the hint!

mmmm

I have never really cared to much about giving my number out, at least with prudence. The people that already have it after 10 years of use have already probably leaked it anywhere and everywhere. What I don’t like doing is being forced to use it in order to be identitied by companies like Google and Facebook who then have a tangible piece of information which which to profile the ‘real’ you with what you do, say, search for, or buy online whether you try to be semi anonymous or not - and seem to think that it’s their right to do that to boot. It’s the fact that is is non optional and there is nothing anyone can do about it that gets me.

graphson

I use temporary numbers for sign-ups. So I don't have to share it with anyone or anywhere.
The service I use is https://anonymsms.com/. Based on real SIMs and free.