In the Google Cloud Platform for almost all services there seems to be a free tier (e.g. Compute Engine, App Engine, Bigtable, Cloud Datastore etc.).
Is it possible to activate these free tiers without providing a credit card data? If these data are required, could you be later billed without your explicit consent? Perhaps because you have bypassed some contractual threshold.
You're always required to provide a credit card or a bank account in order to verify that you're not a bot (otherwise imagine the spam that they would receive).
From the FAQ (https://cloud.google.com/free/docs/frequently-asked-questions):
Why do I need to provide a credit card or bank account for the free trial?
When you sign up for the free trial, you are asked to provide your credit card information. This information is used only to verify your identity and let us know you're not a robot. Your credit card is not charged unless you upgrade to a paid account.
If you do not have a credit card, you can sign up for the free trial by providing a bank account instead of a credit card. To verify that you own the account, you'll provide the account number and routing number. Google deposits a small random amount within 2-3 days. After you've received the deposit, you'll use the deposit amount to finish the process of signing up for the free trial.
You won't be charged until you upgrade to a paid account. Google has limits on all of their free tiers to prevent users going over thresholds.
Note that the Free Tier and Always Free offers have different requirements:
The first is a trial (with a time limit and credit limit) that will ask you to upgrade to a paid account once it's over.
The latter allows you to use cloud services without paying up to a certain usage limit, after which you will be billed at their normal rates. You're only eligible for Always Free if you already have a paid account.
In addition to the above answer, If you'd like to explore more then you MUST updgrade to the account. Why?
The upgraded account will let you work without any issues. You can keep a track on the expenses each resource is utilized. With the expense, you can delete or free the services availed. at last, you can delete the project once you're done with 300$ of free credit.
Yes, Credit card / Debit card ( Mentioned @ some articles ) is required to authenticate that you aren't a bot!
