Facebook introduces SMS-less login verification
Facebook is taking steps to make phone number verification more seamless. Instead of sending an SMS with a one-time password, the company is introducing new tools in Account Kit that’ll let the app automatically verify your phone number.
The mechanic is simple: when you try to sign into an app using your phone number (whether that’s on Facebook or any app using Facebook Login), the app will use Android APIs to match the phone number on the device with the phone number on your account. If the two match up, you’re in!
If not, Facebook will then revert to the old SMS-based method which requires you to wait for the code to hit your text messages and return to the app to put that code in. It’s not a big hassle doing that, but the goal is to make it as quick and as easy as possible to sign-up or sign into a new app, and Facebook says developers are seeing 97% sign-up conversion rates thanks to these changes. App developers who want to implement this new functionality for their users can do so by getting the latest Facebook SDK.
[via Facebook]