Computer systems become paranoia

Alain De Vos · Monday at 11:30 PM

I'm frustrated.
I want to add a girl i know as friend to facebook, but the system decides it seems we don't know eachother so i cannot add here by any means.
I have a mail account with a mail and gsm number recovery i use for everything even facturation.
When i try to log in from freebsd firefox, with one of these recoveries, i always get the error , "something went wrong", try to log in from another device.
Is there some stupid A.I. active which decides for us and we have no means to contact ... ?
That would be a dangerous evolution if you ask me.

Espionage724 · Monday at 11:48 PM

Nothing new in my experience; Discord as of lately wants to force captcha when it used to not present if the account had 2FA enabled. Facebook gives me 3 captcha prompts that I human-defeat by closing the tab and reopening until it stops

Facebook's solution is easy for me: I just host my own social network

Other people can host their own instances or join one that uses decentralized protocols.

kent_dorfman766 · Tuesday at 12:10 AM

My issue is why you are supporting facebook in the first place. Take back your digital privacy. Boycott social media.

Espionage724 · Tuesday at 12:16 AM

kent_dorfman766 said:
My issue is why you are supporting facebook in the first place. Take back your digital privacy. Boycott social media.

If only everyone else did it too

(just like Discord's non-ideal use, I benefit from checking those exclusive spots occasionally even with disliking the platform)

Criosphinx · Tuesday at 12:20 AM

I have helped other people with their Microsoft accounts, the "something went wrong" message means that it's locked temporarily(they don't say for how long) probably because too many failed attempts, you must wait I would recommend at least three days before trying again.

After you can log in again I think the best option is to disable SMS codes, add an authenticator app to generate the OTPs and verify your secondary email. You can also generate and print a recovery code and keep it safe in case you lose your phone.

kent_dorfman766 · Tuesday at 12:32 AM

Criosphinx said:
After you can log in again I think the best option is to disable SMS codes, add an authenticator app to generate the OTPs and verify your secondary email. You can also generate and print a recovery code and keep it safe in case you lose your phone.

Or, and here is a novel concept: don't use M$ accounts at all and then they don't need to know your secondary email account info. There is a reason it's free...it's called data mining.

Espionage724 · Tuesday at 12:42 AM

kent_dorfman766 said:
Or, and here is a novel concept: don't use M$ accounts at all and then they don't need to know your secondary email account info. There is a reason it's free...it's called data mining.

They're also free backup hosts and good email providers

(nobody says you have to use em primarily)

Alain De Vos · 2025-11-26T11:30:09+0000

Any advice on good other email providers i can use. I will "migrate" gradually. Also so i'm lost of all the spam.

cracauer@ · 2025-11-26T13:44:38+0000

Alain De Vos said:
Any advice on good other email providers i can use. I will "migrate" gradually. Also so i'm lost of all the spam.

Gmail is pretty good. The spamfilters toss quite a bit of non-spam, though.

Alain De Vos · 2025-11-26T15:40:08+0000

I set up "swiss proton mail". Time to migrate.

lost_in_c · 2025-11-26T18:17:02+0000

If you think proton will help with authentication screens and lag, I have news for you.

They also have an autogenerated chatbot. Gee I wonder where they got the data to refine that one.

Big disappointment.

drhowarddrfine · 2025-11-26T19:06:02+0000

I've given up on Facebook. I can't delete people I talked to years ago in a chat. When I click on something and it takes me to another page, everything goes away on the page I was on. People I know don't post there anymore hardly. It's just merchandising and I don't want that.

I've been hosting my own email for years and, surprisingly, no longer wind up in spam filters....but how would I know for sure? Did they not reply cause it's in spam? How would I know?

bgroper · 2025-11-26T22:17:54+0000

Alain De Vos said:
I'm frustrated.
I want to add a girl i know as friend to facebook, but the system decides it seems we don't know eachother so i cannot add here by any means.
I have a mail account with a mail and gsm number recovery i use for everything even facturation.
When i try to log in from freebsd firefox, with one of these recoveries, i always get the error , "something went wrong", try to log in from another device.
Is there some stupid A.I. active which decides for us and we have no means to contact ... ?
That would be a dangerous evolution if you ask me.

I don't use any farcebook. Did you try this dance with a different girl ?

mer · 2025-11-26T22:43:51+0000

Facebook, or "every social network thing like linked in" has potential for "usefulness". For me, Facebook is a trivial/easy way to keep in touch/communicate with Family. But I do not have a webpage or app open 24/7. Everyone is different/has different levels of stuff.

scottro · 2025-11-26T23:39:35+0000

I don't have or use Facebook or Instagram, but my wife, who owns an exercise studio, finds it necessary for her business. I think both accounts are under the business name, not her name, but she doesn't complain to me about it so I don't research it at all.

Going back to Alain De Vos's opening post, I don't have any trouble with Waterfox on FreeBSD on various government, banking, and medical (I'm old, I have too many of those), sites.