The thing that bugs me about this model is that it's not challenge-response, so someone can play man-in-the-middle.
While it's possible to hijack someone's phone number, as demonstrated, it requires a relatively high amount of effort per target. Whereas if you compromise a network segment somewhere (with DNS and a rogue SSL cert or whatever you need), you could just sit there, farming authentication cookies. Have your MitM check the "authenticate this computer for 30 days" checkbox and you've got a nice little collection to work with.
While it's possible to hijack someone's phone number, as demonstrated, it requires a relatively high amount of effort per target. Whereas if you compromise a network segment somewhere (with DNS and a rogue SSL cert or whatever you need), you could just sit there, farming authentication cookies. Have your MitM check the "authenticate this computer for 30 days" checkbox and you've got a nice little collection to work with.