Comment by gck1

3 months ago

I live in a small European country. It's not a shithole, but not on everyone's radar either (we got Google Pay just 3 years ago) and I tried to create a new Google account recently.

It asked me to scan the QR code for verification and I'm guessing it tied that account to my device ID because it opened the Google app and added that new account to my device without my approval.

As a fallback (i.e. no attestation or play services), QR code will send SMS to some short code. Well, it turns out that for my country of a few million people, that number simply does not work on 3/3 mobile providers.

I guess Google just doesn't care anymore if it blocks access to their services or in the OP case, all services that use their services to millions of people if they don't fit a particular profile and have a particular device and agree to have all their internet browsing tied to a static ID that Google controls.