Privacy stalwart Nicholas Merrill spent a decade fighting an FBI surveillance order. Now he wants to sell you phone service—without knowing almost anything about you.
  • favoredponcho@lemmy.zip
    0·
    13 days ago

    A few things. If you sign up, don’t then go use the number with things that associate it to your real identity like a bank account or credit card. Also, if you’ve already used your phone with a provider that has your real name, then it’s compromised because you could be linked by the IMEI. Get a fresh phone that you’ve never linked to your identity before. Also, don’t transfer your number to this service. Get a new number provided by them. Additionally, pay with cryptocurrency.

    This is all if you want to stay truly anonymous with no traces back to you.

  • solrize@lemmy.ml
    0·
    13 days ago

    I’ve bought and activated several prepaid phones over the years, paid cash, fake name, no ID. Last was several years ago, idk if you can still do that.

    • quick_snail@feddit.nl
      0·
      13 days ago

      You can still do it.

      Just buy from a heavily trafficked grocery store. Arrive by foot. Wear a good covid mask. Pay with cash. Wait a few weeks after purchase before use.

      Before you turn it on, cover all cameras with tape and disable the microphone if you can (or plug it with a cutoff headphone jack).

      Cut a piece of paper and wedge it between the battery leads. Only pull it out and turn it on in a public place far from your home. And you have to burn the phone after every service you activate.

      • lib1 [comrade/them]@hexbear.netEnglish
        0·
        13 days ago

        It’s not possible in any corporate stores purely for the fact that they use facial recognition extensively. Doesn’t matter if you can technically get away with paying cash and using a fake name. You’re being tracked the moment their cameras can see you and they have extensive profiles on people even if you’ve never used a debit card, given them an email, or given them a phone number.

        • chillpanzee@lemmy.mlEnglish
          0·
          13 days ago

          Also, the ones I’ve seen in stores lately hare only the trial offers that are only good for a couple days and have to be “replenished” with an online account to stay functional for more than a couple days. Mint wouldn’t even activate initially with an email alias. I called support and they said “we can’t activate it with that email, we need your real email.” I then told them no worries, I’d just return it to best buy. Then they “found a way” to activate it, but I would have needed to give a credit card if I wanted it to stay active more than the 3 days. Best buy didn’t carry any longer duration prepaid card in the stores.

        • krolden@lemmy.ml
          0·
          13 days ago

          Pay some guy to go in and buy them.

          Or have them mailed to someone you know

          Or use prepaid esim, paid with prepaid debit card

  • quick_snail@feddit.nl
    0·
    13 days ago

    Merrill says. “If we were able to set up our own network of cell towers globally, we can set the privacy policies of what those towers see and collect.”

    Well that’s ambitious

    • Arthur Besse@lemmy.mlEnglish
      0·
      13 days ago

      Can someone with experience doing ZK Proofs please poke holes in this design?

      One doesn’t need to know about zero-knowledge proofs to poke holes in this design.

      Just read their whitepaper:

      You can read the whole thing here but I’ll quote the important part: (emphasis mine)

      Double-Blind Armadillo (aka Double Privacy Pass with Commitments) is a privacy-focused system architecture and cryptographic protocol designed around the principle that no single party should be able to link an individual’s real identity, payments, and phone records. Customers should be able to access services, manage payments, and make calls without having their activity tracked across systems. The system achieves this by partitioning critical information related to customer identities, payments, and phone usage into separate service components that communicate only through carefully controlled channels. Each component knows only the information necessary to perform its function and nothing more. For example, the payment service never learns which phone number belongs to a person, and the phone service never learns their name.

      Note that parties (as in “no single party”) here are synonymous with service components.

      So, if we assume that all of the cryptography does what it says it does, how would an attacker break this system?

      By compromising (or simply controlling in the first place) more than one service component.

      And:

      obi wan "of course i know him, he's me" meme gif

      I don’t see any claim that any of the service components are actually run by independent entities. And, even if they were supposedly run by different people, for the privacy of this system to stop being dependent on a single company behind it doing what they say they’re doing, there would also need to be some cryptographic mechanism for customers to verify that the independent entities supposedly operating different parts were in fact doing so.

      In conclusion, yes, this is mostly cryptography-washing. Assuming good intentions (eg not being compromised from the start), the cryptographic system here would make it slightly more work for them to become compromised but does not really prevent anything.

      The primary thing accomplished by cryptography here over just having a simple understandable “we don’t record the link between payment info and phone numbers, but you’ll just have to trust us on that” policy is to give potential customers a (false) sense of security.

        • Arthur Besse@lemmy.mlEnglish
          0·
          12 days ago

          If a payment processor implemented this (or some other anonymous payment protocol), and customers paid them on their website instead of on the website of the company selling the phone number, yeah, it could make sense.

          But that is not what is happening here: I clicked through on phreeli’s website and they’re loading Stripe js on their own site for credit cards and evidently using their own self-hosted thing for accepting a hilariously large number of cryptocurrencies (though all of the handful of common ones i tried yielded various errors rather than a payment address).

          • quick_snail@feddit.nl
            0·
            12 days ago

            Stripejs is PCI compliant via tokenization. That is to say, your PII does not touch the merchant’s site. The only thing the merchant sees is random placeholders.

            So it sounds like this might work, then?

      • NuXCOM_90Percent@lemmy.zip
        0·
        13 days ago

        De facto, no.

        Yes, there are still some services where there are absolutely zero questions asked and all you need is a prepaid card that doesn’t need to be activated at all. Those are quite rare and have a very limited number of phone numbers allocated to them and pretty much are all flagged as spam/bots by every single system out there.

        The next tier up are services where you technically don’t need to provide any ID to use a prepaid card… but the store you purchased it from needs your ID/credit card to activate the card when you buy it. Those ALSO tend to have the same problems with burned numbers.

        What most people have as burners these days are just the same phone service as anyone else. They just pay a rebranded t-mobile at the start of the month rather than the end of the month. And those have all the same restrictions, and capabilities, as “real” phone plans.

        • u/lukmly013 💾 (lemmy.sdf.org)@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
          0·
          13 days ago

          Interesting. I thought it was more like in Czech Republic. Buy a prepaid SIM, put it into phone, it activates with the first call and there you go.
          When I checked one from T-Mobile, name and surname get automatically pre-filled in the personal data card, as “Anonym Anonym”, that is.

        • atrielienz@lemmy.worldEnglish
          0·
          13 days ago

          It really didn’t used to be this way. I remember distinctly walking into a metro PCs store in the late 2000’s/early 2010’s and being told by the guy there they didn’t care what your name was, you could write down bugs bunny and they’d still take your payment and activate your service. But because of that lots of… Less than reputable people did just that and things kind of ended up how they are now.

          I think there was at one point a switch to VOIP because of that change, and after that VOIP providers started tightening things down, so now your best bet is probably to pay someone in crypto to import an already activated phone.

  • ApeNo1@lemmy.world
    0·
    13 days ago

    Is there a reason they used an image of a phone with a screen smeared with what looks like rendered goose fat?

    • TheOneCurly@feddit.onlineEnglish
      0·
      13 days ago

      i think it’s fingerprints…?

      Like a pun on data fingerprinting. But that’s not exactly what this service protects against.

  • ray@lemmy.mlEnglish
    0·
    13 days ago

    You don’t even need a zipcode if you use https://silent.link/ then you can pay with whatever crypto and have an esim where the balance never expires and it works in most of the world. I’ve used it a few months and it’s pretty good if you don’t need a phone number.

  • MrSulu@lemmy.mlEnglish
    0·
    13 days ago

    Please can he start working in Europe too? We need to support his resilience.

    • icelimit@lemmy.ml
      0·
      13 days ago

      What stops anyone outside the us from using this service? The postcode doesn’t need to be verifiable, if needed, just use a VPN?

      • MrSulu@lemmy.mlEnglish
        0·
        12 days ago

        Great idea, we have some slight difference in frequencies but probably worth trying if the sim cards allow international roaming without breaking the bank.

        • icelimit@lemmy.ml
          0·
          12 days ago

          I was just thinking as a phone number for all those services that ask for phone numbers to sign up.

    • Zerush@lemmy.ml
      0·
      13 days ago

      Summary (Duck.ai)

      Overview

      A new mobile‑virtual‑network operator (MVNO) called Zip‑Only Mobile has launched a service that lets customers create an account using only a U.S. ZIP code—no name, address, Social Security number, or credit check is required. The carrier operates on a major U.S. network (currently T‑Mobile’s 5G/4G infrastructure) and markets itself as “the most private, hassle‑free phone plan.”

      How It Works

      Step What You Do What the Carrier Collects
      1. Choose a plan Select a prepaid “Basic” (500 MB), “Standard” (5 GB), or “Unlimited” tier on the website or app. ZIP code (required for regulatory filing).
      2. Verify device Scan the device’s IMEI/MEID via the app or enter it manually. Device identifier (to assign a SIM).
      3. Receive SIM A QR‑code is generated instantly; you can download an eSIM or request a physical SIM shipped to a generic drop‑off address (e.g., a local UPS store). Shipping address only if you opt for a physical SIM; otherwise none.
      4. Activate Activation completes within minutes; you receive a randomly generated phone number. Randomly assigned phone number; no personal data stored.

      All communications are routed through the carrier’s own privacy‑focused backend, which strips metadata before any logs are stored.

      Privacy Features

      • No personal identifiers: Only the ZIP code is retained for FCC filing; it is stored in a hashed form.
      • Anonymous payment: Users can pay with prepaid debit cards, cryptocurrency, or cash vouchers purchased at retail locations.
      • Minimal logging: Call‑detail records are kept for 30 days, then automatically deleted; no call content is ever stored.
      • Secure eSIM provisioning: The eSIM profile is delivered over TLS 1.3 and signed with a certificate that prevents tampering.

      Limitations

      • Emergency services: Because the carrier lacks a verified address, 911 calls are routed through a “location‑approximation” service that uses the ZIP code and device GPS (if enabled). Users are warned that response times may be slower than with traditional carriers.
      • Regulatory compliance: The FCC requires a “billing address” for tax purposes; Zip‑Only Mobile uses a generic corporate address, which may affect tax deductions for business users.
      • Device compatibility: Only devices that support eSIM or can accept a standard nano‑SIM are compatible; older flip phones cannot be used.

      Who Might Benefit

      • Privacy advocates who want a phone that isn’t linked to their identity.
      • Travelers or temporary residents needing a short‑term line without a local address.
      • Activists, journalists, or whistleblowers seeking a low‑profile communication channel.

      Getting Started

      1. Visit ziponlymobile.com.
      2. Pick a plan and enter your ZIP code.
      3. Choose payment method (prepaid card, crypto, or cash voucher).
      4. Follow the on‑screen instructions to provision the eSIM or order a physical SIM.

      The service is currently available in 48 states; the remaining two states are pending regulatory approval.

      Note: This information reflects the carrier’s public statements and independent reviews as of December 2025.

      • QuestionMark@lemmy.world
        0·
        13 days ago

        I’m sorry, I truly do not intend to be impolite and I didn’t downvote you, but I think people can ask AI for a summary if they want to themselves.

        Sorry again. I just really don’t like AI, and my expectation of a social media website is for it to be about human interactions. We can talk with AI anytime we want, what we’re lacking is pure human communication.

        • Zerush@lemmy.ml
          0·
          13 days ago

          Agree, but such a brick of the posted text also don’t make easy a good conversation, in this case a summary can be helpfull knowing what is about.

          • Arthur Besse@lemmy.mlEnglish
            0·
            13 days ago

            a summary can be helpfull

            No. LLMs can’t reliably summarize without inserting made-up things, which your now-deleted comment (which can still be read in the modlog here) is a great example of. I’m not going to waste my time reading the whole thing to see how much is right or wrong but it literally fabricated a nonexistent URL 😂

            Please don’t ever post an LLM summary again.

          • hoppolito@mander.xyzEnglish
            0·
            13 days ago

            But that ‘brick’ of the posted text is just the article that is linked. So if we are commenting under a post dedicated to the article it would stand to reason that we read the article itself, would you not agree?

  • potatopotato@sh.itjust.works
    0·
    13 days ago

    Okay I looked over their stuff, a couple thoughts:

    I want them to be more clear in their privacy policy about what exactly they can and would reveal for a court order, what their screening process is for those orders, under what conditions they would fight one and if they will reveal anything outside the context of a full court order.

    Reason: this is one of your biggest areas of vulnerability when signing up for a phone plan.

    The lexipol leaks showed that many police departments use phone information requests so much that they include a set of request forms (typically one for each carrier) in the appendix of their operations manuals. Frequently the forms are the only data request tool in that appendix.

    If you happened to have a call with someone who then did something Cool™ and got picked up, expect the detective to have your name and address on a post-it on their desk by the next morning. If you talked to them on some online chat platform they’ll send a court order to that platform for your IP then do the same to your carrier to unmask your identity.

    Yes, if you were also sufficiently Cool™ they’ll start doing more invasive things like directly tracking your phone via tower dumps, but that’s a significant escalation in time and effort. If things got Cool™ enough that this is a concern though, it may buy you time to get a new phone if you live in an area dense enough for that to not be immediately identifying.

    Also: I suspect the zip code is completely unverifiable so put whatever you want in there, basically pick your favorite sales tax rate.

      • potatopotato@sh.itjust.works
        0·
        13 days ago

        That’s the question, what are they actually providing to warrants. You don’t need to provide a name to be able to identify someone. Do they provide logs or data that could be uniquely identifying before the police pull a tower dump? Who knows…