Yep, at that point they’re just fishing for more which, hey, why wouldn’t they.

It’s a give and take for sure, requiring a real phone number makes it harder for automated spam bots to use the service, but at the same time, it puts the weight of true privacy on the shoulders and wallets of the users, and in a lesser way, incentives the use of less than reputable services, should a user want to truly keep their activities private.

And yeah, there’s an argument to be made for keeping crime at bay, but that also comes with risks itself. If there was some way to keep truly egregious use at bay while not risking a $10,000 fine on someone for downloading an episode of Ms. Marvel, I think that would be great.