3 ms·

Sticking my German sim card into my phone for fifteen minutes in all sorts of random countries and continents and waiting for a number to come through always fe

Sticking my German sim card into my phone for fifteen minutes in all sorts of random countries and continents and waiting for a number to come through always feels absurd. I pray for the rise of esims! I feel like it's on the cards.

lxgr 4y ago
I've been using eSIMs for the past couple of years for this specific use case, and while they certainly help, it's really just a stop-gap measure: You still need your phone and cell signal to receive them (at least many European carriers don't support SMS over VoWIFI); the eSIM is "stuck" in your phone if it physically breaks (and on many carriers, you can't re-use an eSIM QR activation code in any case); in many countries, SIMs expire after a couple of months or even weeks of inactivity, losing your number permanently, to name just a few. I've found Google Voice to work quite well as a workaround for almost all of these problems, but unfortunately, many US companies insist on not allowing VoIP numbers for 2FA or even plain account creation purposes. I usually try to avoid these companies.
- mwint 4y ago
  > the eSIM is "stuck" in your phone if it physically breaks Wait, does this happen?
  - heavenlyblue 4y ago
    That's overly dramatic, of course you can re-create it on the other phone. But what's true is that you can't physically transfer it.
    - lxgr 4y ago
      I wasn't trying to be dramatic here: Without deleting an eSIM profile from a device, all implementations I know indeed disallow reinstalling the profile on another device. (The eSIM standard effectively enforces the singleton nature of an instantiated eSIM profile.) But of course most providers can re-issue eSIMs if required, just like they can mail a physical SIM replacement. But in many cases, they either charge for it, require more or less involved bureaucratic acrobatics (including sending the QR code via physical mail as proof-of-address, because they've been burned badly by eSIM swapping), or both. So the assumption that an eSIM activation (QR) code is more or less like a bearer token that you can keep in your password safe and use whenever required often does not hold true, especially when needed most (traveling internationally etc). Fortunately, my provider is pretty good about it (I can instantly self-serve reissue an eSIM in their portal free of charge), but that seems to be the exception, and I also don't know how I feel about that, security-wise. (They don't offer 2FA, as far as I know.)
  - jaclaz 4y ago
    More common case. Your phone breaks (broken screen, swollen battery, whatever). With a physical SIM you can physically extract the SIM and insert it in another (spare) phone (and you can even borrow one for a few minutes). To transfer an e-SIM you need to authorize the transfer on the old phone (the one that doesn't work): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32138466 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32138466
Timpy 4y ago
I thought I got everything moved over to an authenticator app before leaving home but I forgot one, I got a "check your phone for verification SMS" earlier today. My American SIM could get the text but my foreign sim was giving my laptop internet access. Big pain in the ass.
xani_ 4y ago
Eh, I greatly prefer ability to move the very reliable thing from one phone to another, just use another phone instead of going into paperwork to move it if my phone gets damaged or something

lxgr 4y ago

I've been using eSIMs for the past couple of years for this specific use case, and while they certainly help, it's really just a stop-gap measure: You still need your phone and cell signal to receive them (at least many European carriers don't support SMS over VoWIFI); the eSIM is "stuck" in your phone if it physically breaks (and on many carriers, you can't re-use an eSIM QR activation code in any case); in many countries, SIMs expire after a couple of months or even weeks of inactivity, losing your number permanently, to name just a few. I've found Google Voice to work quite well as a workaround for almost all of these problems, but unfortunately, many US companies insist on not allowing VoIP numbers for 2FA or even plain account creation purposes. I usually try to avoid these companies.

mwint 4y ago
> the eSIM is "stuck" in your phone if it physically breaks Wait, does this happen?
- heavenlyblue 4y ago
  That's overly dramatic, of course you can re-create it on the other phone. But what's true is that you can't physically transfer it.
  - lxgr 4y ago
    I wasn't trying to be dramatic here: Without deleting an eSIM profile from a device, all implementations I know indeed disallow reinstalling the profile on another device. (The eSIM standard effectively enforces the singleton nature of an instantiated eSIM profile.) But of course most providers can re-issue eSIMs if required, just like they can mail a physical SIM replacement. But in many cases, they either charge for it, require more or less involved bureaucratic acrobatics (including sending the QR code via physical mail as proof-of-address, because they've been burned badly by eSIM swapping), or both. So the assumption that an eSIM activation (QR) code is more or less like a bearer token that you can keep in your password safe and use whenever required often does not hold true, especially when needed most (traveling internationally etc). Fortunately, my provider is pretty good about it (I can instantly self-serve reissue an eSIM in their portal free of charge), but that seems to be the exception, and I also don't know how I feel about that, security-wise. (They don't offer 2FA, as far as I know.)
- jaclaz 4y ago
  More common case. Your phone breaks (broken screen, swollen battery, whatever). With a physical SIM you can physically extract the SIM and insert it in another (spare) phone (and you can even borrow one for a few minutes). To transfer an e-SIM you need to authorize the transfer on the old phone (the one that doesn't work): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32138466 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32138466

Timpy 4y ago

I thought I got everything moved over to an authenticator app before leaving home but I forgot one, I got a "check your phone for verification SMS" earlier today. My American SIM could get the text but my foreign sim was giving my laptop internet access. Big pain in the ass.

xani_ 4y ago

Eh, I greatly prefer ability to move the very reliable thing from one phone to another, just use another phone instead of going into paperwork to move it if my phone gets damaged or something