Facebook signaled its first big change for Messenger when it split the messaging service off into a separate app more than a year ago, and it's now gone another big step further in untying it from the main Facebook service. The company announced today that you'll no longer need a Facebook account to use it.

To start with, that requirement is being dropped for users in the United States, Canada, Peru and Venezuela, who will be able to register for the app using their name, phone number and a photo instead. Once signed up that way, the app will let you pull contacts from your phone's address book instead of Facebook, and you'll still be able to take advantage of all the usual Messenger features to chat with people whether they're signed in with a Facebook account or not.

Speaking to the Wall Street Journal, Facebook's David Marcus explained the move by saying "messaging is such a primary use case we didn't want to make it a prerequisite to have a Facebook account." 

Naturally, though, Facebook is still encouraging folks to use their Facebook login if they have one (or to create one if they don't), and it remains unclear just how free of Facebook folks will be when they sign up without an account.