13 ms·

Qualcomm wants to replace eSIMs with iSIMs, has the first certified SoC

116 points by laktak 4y ago

thedays 4y ago
eSIMs are less convenient and less flexible than regular SIM cards - will iSIMs be any different? How many iSIMs will a phone support? Will they support dual iSIMs or triple iSIMs so I can use one mobile number for work, another for my personal life and a third to use when I'm travelling overseas and want to avoid expensive roaming charges?
- MrBuddyCasino 4y ago
  At least on the iPhone you can add many and activate two simultaneously. Most phones weren’t dual-sim!
  - mschuster91 4y ago
    Dual-SIM phones were the hot shit for years when phones were beginning to take off. I remember some weird adapters that cycled through SIMs when the phone was restarted and all kinds of other hacks.
    - gambiting 4y ago
      I mean, all top end Samsungs are proper dual SIM phones still(they take two physical Sims). #1 reason why I'm still buying them and not any other brand. iPhones also support dual SIM but only with one physical card and one eSIM.
      - pmontra 4y ago
        Also not top end ones. Example, the Samsung A40, a mid range sub 300 EUR phone. There is plenty of space for SIMs in nowadays' ridiculously sized phones.
    - coretx 4y ago
      You don't even need Dual-SIM phones, contemporary SIM can contain various numbers/administrations. Both with and without hackery involved. It's just that the carriers don't want it / block it. This is also why many of them outright refuse to sell phones with dual SIM capability.
      - mschuster91 4y ago
        > This is also why many of them outright refuse to sell phones with dual SIM capability. At least here in the EU, carriers don't follow typical US customs any more... a series of court verdicts following the 2005 commerce directive has all but eliminated SIM locking and other hostile practices by carriers, the worst you (unfortunately) still get is bloatware.
  - MisterSandman 4y ago
    Which is awesome, but it also means that dual-sim capabilities is completely software based. In 10-20 years, could this be part of a subscribption, or be disabled by certain carriers who don't want you to use a cheaper data plan along with their sim?
    - MrBuddyCasino 4y ago
      They could have demanded this from physical dual-sim models as well. There is always some kind of software involved.
- jplona 4y ago
  Why are eSIMs less convenient for you? In all of the interactions I've had, eSIM works without issue and right away. Most of the times I've needed a physical SIM card I've had to wait for it to be mailed or plan a trip to a physical store, or the old one is the wrong size and I need a new one or an adapter.
  - gambiting 4y ago
    I can swap sims in about 30 seconds. With eSim I need to ask my carrier for a new eSim registration code to be generated which takes 48 hours. It's insane and I have no idea why we agreed to this standard.
    - IshKebab 4y ago
      Sounds like an issue with your carrier rather than the eSIM standard. I recently went to Europe and was able to buy a cheap data eSIM (1GB for £2) and activate it in the airport basically instantly. With SIMs I would have had to order it through the post like a week in advance, and there's no way I would have gotten that price. eSIMs are amazingly convenient for travelling: https://esimdb.com/ https://esimdb.com/
    - jplona 4y ago
      I think "insane" is a strong characterization. I swap SIMs every couple of years, so a delay of 48h is well within the scope of planning for such an event. Additionally, I happened to do an eSIM swap today and it took about an hour. For some use cases it's more convenient than a physical card, for some use cases (or implementations) it's less convenient. That doesn't make it insane.
  - i_love_cookies 4y ago
    at&t refuses to give me a esim for the pixel6 i bought though them on the same account the concept itself is fine the implementation is a downgrade since it gives the carriers more control
    - roneythomas6 4y ago
- asimpletune 4y ago
  I’m not sure what you’re talking about. I know people who traveled for months, and they have half a dozen eSIMs on their phone. When they enter one of those countries, they just toggle the sim to active and it’s good to go. They do this all the while having a USA physical sim as well. This on iPhone btw.
  - zarzavat 4y ago
    Okay but how do you get local prices if there is no local eSIM? The best you can hope for is a travel SIM which may be multiple times more expensive than a local SIM.
    - asimpletune 4y ago
      If you can’t find one then i guess you can’t get local prices, but I’ve never had a problem getting an esim, including in Albania and Turkey. You just go to the a carrier store and you ask, scan a QR code, and you’re done. Most of the time the big cities that you would arrive in anyways will have them.
- krzyk 4y ago
  eSIMs are more convenient - few days ago I changed carriers, and it was done just on the phone - I didn't have to go to physical store, I didn't had to wait for the SIM card to arrive by mail. The only issue I can see is that I can't take that card out and put it in a USB modem to use in my router. But I have seperate SIM for that, that has cheaper data plan than my ordinary phone.
ipv6ipv4 4y ago
Why isn't this a bit of generic software that can run on anything?
- kube-system 4y ago
  As I understand, it’s because they also have some physical security concerns. They operate kind of like a secure enclave I guess.
  - astrange 4y ago
    It's a "secure element" which is almost exactly like a "secure enclave". NFC payments also use them.
    - fsckboy 4y ago
      but who is it secured from tampering, and secured to protect whom? The carriers? the customer? the NSA? Qualcomm? for encryption? for signing? ID/auth? "auth" of the above?
- bilekas 4y ago
  It's a physical storage about the carrier. as far as i understand it's more convenient for carriers to onboard clients and also for users in general if a phone dies for example you can swap it into another. There are CDMA enabled phones that do not need a SIM card but they're a pain to transfer to another carrier. At least today.
  - vasco 4y ago
    I don't need to swap a physical thing to log into my bank on another phone if my main one dies. I'm not sure why this is the answer.
    - bilekas 4y ago
      But imagine you have 2FA sms verification (horrible practice but prevalent) and your phone is dead. Sim swap out is helpful. I don't approve of it personally, but it's a legacy method anyway.
chamakits 4y ago
This seems like an inevitability; since eSIMs are already here, and manufacturers are going to be thrilled to have fewer moving parts. But it’s disappointing all round. I absolutely love how easy it is for me to buy a new phone, swap in my old SIM and I’m instantly using my old number. As painful as transferring everything else is with new phones, at least I easily keep the same number. With this (and I’d guess with eSIM too) I just have to hope that their process to transfer SIMs work flawlessly. And I have very little confidence in that. Sidenote: also disappointed this gets published uncritically as if published by the phone manufacturers themselves, celebrating this as a pure positive instead of the trade off it is.
- MisterSandman 4y ago
  I feel like this is gearing up to bring back contracts or phone locks, in a way. A family member recently bought an iPhone from the US to a non-US country, without realizing that the US models are eSim-only. They have to change carriers because only the fancy, expensive carriers offer eSim. I would not be surprised if they find other ways to make it harder to install an eSim in a different carriers phone. Also, another thing I hate about having an eSim is that it sorta forces you to install your carriers app, which for some cheap/mid-tier carriers is an ad-infested mess.
- godzillabrennus 4y ago
  SIM cards were never swappable for me. They were locked to a phone. Changing to a new handset meant going to the carriers store or having them ship me one. I welcome the ease of portability that eSIM brings.
  - secondcoming 4y ago
    In order to test various 5G offerings, I have 3 SIM cards at the moment. All are freely swappable between my phone and my 5G router.
  - LeoPanthera 4y ago
    This feels like an American perspective. In Europe (and Asia too?), sim-swapping is pretty seamless, and relatively common.
bilekas 4y ago
I feel really old thinking that i remember the model of sim cards that were credit card size and not shown in the diagram.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- kube-system 4y ago
  You still get them in that format (but breakaway into smaller formats) if you buy a bring-your-own-sim kit from many carriers.
  - jraph 4y ago
    Where? Here you can get the "breakaway into smaller formats" thing but not credit-card sized, the biggest size is Mini SIM.
    - somat 4y ago
      All the sims I have ever received(US) come as a credit card sized item(looks like a smart card) and you break out the size you need. (sim, mini sim, micro sim)
    - gambiting 4y ago
      Here in UK you get that from most carriers.
    - kube-system 4y ago
      Any US carrier, in my experience. https://www.flyamz.com/storage/2020/03/USA-SIM-Card-New-ATT-Bulk-Blank-Sim-Card-4G-LTE-3-IN-1-Standard-Micro-Nano-Unactivated-Empty-card-1-600x612.png https://www.flyamz.com/storage/2020/03/USA-SIM-Card-New-ATT-... https://images5.tanganetwork.com/prod?bucket=tanga-fetched-images-prod&filename=78f2dc94d0131ccaa0540024.jpeg&width=700&height=700&quality=90 https://images5.tanganetwork.com/prod?bucket=tanga-fetched-i... https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/61bYyPhpYoL._AC_SL1200_.jpg https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/61bYyPhpYoL._AC_SL1200_....
jjtheblunt 4y ago
This looks like paid Qualcomm PR, for the following reason. From the article, it looks a lot like Qualcomm trying to coopt the eSIM success now a few years old, by saying the electronics of iSIM are a custom block in their silicon, not a separate small chip. But it doesn't clarify that others (like Apple obviously) can't realize their eSIMs in their custom SOC, as far as i see. > Qualcomm says "the new iSIM is fully compliant with the GSMA Remote SIM Provisioning standard; meaning its subscriptions are remotely manageable through any standard platforms." That's the same standard as eSIM, and it's held to all the same security requirements, so theoretically, any carrier that works with eSIM shouldn't see a difference between an eSIM and an iSIM. iSIM is still just a hunk of silicon that needs software provisioning—where the silicon lives shouldn't really matter to your carrier.
- bjackman 4y ago
  Yeah AFAICT this article is just: Qualcomm is now a certified producer of eSIMs. They put them in the SoC. Everything else including the term "iSIM" just seems to be marketing cruft? Perhaps I'm missing some detail but it seems the only people who would have any reason to care about this would be Qualcomm's customers in the mobile OEM space.
  - coretx 4y ago
    Because it's in software, they can legally disable your phone and force you to buy a new phone every 3 year citing "security patches no longer being issued". Bye bye aftermarket firmware second life !
    - franga2000 4y ago
      They could be doing this already if they wanted to. I agree they shouldn't have this ability in the first place, but this doesn't change anything.
      - kuschku 4y ago
        They can't do that with physical SIMs, because at least in the EU, there are regulations against that (to regulate stuff like phones and SIMs locked to each other)
shalmanese 4y ago
Can anyone explain why eSIM was the stopgap solution and we didn't go straight from physical SIM to iSIM? What special requirements does a SIM card have that it was easier to put it on a seperate chip? Now that we've moved to iSIM, does this remove the artificial limitation on the number of SIMs a phone can support? Can I buy a phone in 2030 and load it up with 50 different PAYG SIM cards?
- kramerger 4y ago
  My guess is that the French SIM companies put all kind of artificial limitations on esim so they could keep their marketshare and continue earning money on licensing and patents
  - coretx 4y ago
    It's not only french companies producing them and the entities who are involved in pushing SIM replacements aren't as interested in mundane things such as marketshare, money etc. as you might think. Don't forget this one for example: https://theintercept.com/2015/02/19/great-sim-heist/ https://theintercept.com/2015/02/19/great-sim-heist/ I don't think the french abuse their SIM-powerposition, otherwise they would not force states like Palestine into using weaker encryption and such.
    - kramerger 4y ago
      We are discussing two completely different issues :) If you ever worked in telecom, you know for the fact that the SIM companies have sabotaged and vetoed every attempt to get a sane eSIM or SIM-free standard. And nothing against the French :) , it just happens that the two largest and most agreesive companies in this area have French connections (Thales and Gemalto)
      - coretx 4y ago
        No denial from my side there, but regarding the other point: what else do those two have in common with each other ? Sometimes things really are what they look like.
squarefoot 4y ago
I'll see this as a good move only if it can be fully supported by FOSS operating systems, otherwise it becomes just another tool to lock in users to closed platforms.
Uptrenda 4y ago
Wasn't one of the benefits of a smart card model was having a totally isolated chip that could run minimal software and provide a limited surface for attack? If you add everything to the same chip then doesn't this reduce the advantages of having that separate smart card (together with it's anti-tampering design)? We're also supposed to trust Qualcomm that this is secure... Sounds totally legit. SIM cards aren't perfect but I feel like there is a benefit to them. Especially since they use the same tech as credit card chips, don't they (universal integrated circuit cards.) It's hard for me to want to trust this as much as a platform used by literally every consumer payment bank and carrier out there vs Qualcomms priority spec. I think anyone who does secure communication already doesn't want to touch Qualcomm products because you can't audit their designs. Unfortunately, that's usually what is shipped as the baseband modem in most phones... A single company making one of the most important communication products... Nope, no problem there...
- audunw 4y ago
  I haven't worked on iSIM myself, but I have colleagues that work on integrating iSIM onto an SoC. The procedure around integrating an iSIM into an SoC is ridiculously strict. The integration and simulation has to happen on a workstation in a special room, not connected to the rest of the network, with camera surveillance, etc. > We're also supposed to trust Qualcomm that this is secure I don't know if Qualcomm can do things differently. I don't know if they can design the iSIM themselves instead of integrating from a trusted third party. But I doubt that the security requirement is any less strict. Telecom operators seem to be extremely paranoid about this stuff. Essentially, it seems like it's not that much different from eSIM, you're just putting a similar kind of trusted module on the SoC instead of on the PCB. > together with it's anti-tampering design I'd be very surprised if iSIM and the whole Qualcomm SoC isn't designed with anti-tampering mechanisms. Seems like anti-tampering is becoming a general requirement for SoCs (with upgradable firmware and root-of-trust) being designed now.
- zamadatix 4y ago
  Ultimately the weakest link in SIM security is the support rep at your telephony provider.
- 4y ago
eloisant 4y ago
Something I don't understand: why eSIM or iSIM have to be hardware, why can't it be pure software, some credentials stored on the storage of the phone?
- can16358p 4y ago
  That's why I think too. We have secure enclave and all that for anything cryptographically secure and isolated. Just interface with that for the keystore/signing and have everything in software. A possible attack vector? Perhaps if something's not coded correctly... which can easily be fixed with software update. I'm sure there's more into this of course, but that should be the general motivation.
can16358p 4y ago
TBH I didn't know eSIM was some physical extra hardware albeit small. I'm surprised that eSIM isn't what iSIM is in the first place: some negligible module inside the IC.
_8j50 4y ago
Oh well I guess I should plan on stopping the usage of smartphones in a few years and start calling my congressman and lobbying to have laws that allow me to function in society without a smartphone. I hated eSIMs but at least I could solder them off like bluetooth,gps or even wifi sometimes for some devices like the kindle paper (I just upload books to it with USB). I know there is market demand for laptops with hardware key switches and that are pro-privacy but how big or competitive is it? I want to make disconnected versions of products. From TVs to appliances, home automation, camera systems and smart phones (of course not on my own lol). I call this vision of products "smarter technology", because my goal is not to reduce functionality or features but to engineer products in a smarter way that does not require internet connectivity (but in some cases a hardware switch can enable network/radio connectivity. I am desparately searching for products like this these days. An IP camera that is effectively PoE powered but acts like a webcam for your desktop when you set it up that way or with a mini-dvr that will stream it locally via wifi/ethernet or optionally through a paid cloud subscription (profit $$$). I want that. A car with a hardware button to turn off connectivity features but also has all the cool modern car features that don't need network connectivity and a fully manual driving mode with optionally replacable batteries (replace them in seconds instead of wait in a queue and charge after an hour) A TV where you can remove the builtin computer and it can still display hdmi,displayport,etc... and you can reprogram it as you wish. A phone that can only make calls and stream display input via BLE or other radio from an optional computer that it can physically get attached to, but you can also take this optional computer with you and connect it to a wireless dock to use it as a desktop or laptop or to interface/manage your home automation and security. I would prefer to donate to someone else to get them to do all this but if the market is strong enough, I don't mind making a lot of money doing it myself either.
DeathArrow 4y ago
Why is this a positive story? Downsides: -it is more cumbersome to replace phones, as you have to move identities from phone to phone and get approvals by carriers and device makers instead of just replacing the physical SIM -you can't just hand over your phone to someone else, you have to unroll yourself and enroll the other person -you don't have anonymity and privacy since is no longer possible to use a prepaid physical SIM And what are the advantages? Cost savings of maybe $1 for a pohone that costs over $1000?
- pilif 4y ago
  > it is more cumbersome to replace phones, as you have to move identities from phone to phone and get approvals by carriers and device makers instead of just replacing the physical SIM That really depends on the carrier. In my case, setting up a new iPhone to replace an old one means saying yes in the prompt displayed by the phone. Nothing else. This is more convenient than having to search for the SIM removal tool. > -you can't just hand over your phone to someone else, you have to unroll yourself and enroll the other person For me this is a big feature because I would never hand my phone to somebody else, but an attacker is very likely to remove the SIM card and put it into their phone. Now suddenly many 2FA accounts are protected by a 4 digit PIN rather than my 20 digit phone passphrase. > -you don't have anonymity and privacy since is no longer possible to use a prepaid physical SIM It works exactly the same way as it did with physical SIM cards only the physical card is replaced by a QR code displayed on a screen or a printed paper. If the carrier sells anonymous prepaid SIM cards, nothing prevents them from selling anonymous prepaid QR codes.
  - goosedragons 4y ago
    How much more complicated and annoying is the process if you're going iPhone to Android or Android to iPhone? You take the SIM card out before handing it someone else.
    - pilif 4y ago
      you scan the QR code with your android phone. That will cause your existing phone to be unregistered. What eSIM does is turn the physical smart card into a QR code which can be shown on a screen in addition to being printed on a piece of physical paper.
zx8080 4y ago
If I understand it correctly, it's not possible to switch esim to another phone in two scenarious: - dead battery in the current esim holder phone - no internet - crashed or somehow broken esim holder phone The worst thing is that it probably won't be even possible to buy anything since banks tend to tie 2nd payment factor to phone (notifications) or sms. Complete lock up is very possible. I won't use esim as much as possible at all.
- camillomiller 4y ago
  That is incorrect. Carriers hold the provisioning power on the esim. They can easily send you a new QR code after invalidating the previous esim in the dead or stolen phone. It’s literally a procedure that takes a few seconds. Many providers here in Europe already have automated web based interfaces in place for that, or a dedicated customer support pathway/process. Some are trying to turn this into a paid-for service and that’s of course not acceptable. The scenarios you describe are all taken into account. It’s much more of a hassle to deal with physical sims in the scenario of a destroyed, stolen or lost phone. In terms of privacy nothing changes. Most country require a full scale ID procedure to emit and assign a sim. That’s the same for esims and physical sims. What changes for carriers right now is that they have to recoup the investment on the esim management infrastructure and that’s why, at least initially, the friction will come from having to pay for esim-related services that should be free.
- ezfe 4y ago
  While in some cases you need to transfer the eSIM, you can also just as easily provision a new eSIM - ex. on Visible, you'd just download the app to your new phone, sign in, and tap install eSIM button.
Idiot_in_Vain 4y ago
Wonder if QC holds any iSIM related patents, that will prevent their competition from offering iSIMs.
- freeAgent 4y ago
  I don’t see much real difference to an end user between an eSIM and an “iSIM.” iSIM seems to me just to be Qualcomm’s name for their own eSIM solution that will come in the same package as their SoCs. There may be an extremely small power-savings to be had, but that’s probably easily overwhelmed by other aspects of the phone hardware and software.
martyvis 4y ago
TIL that an eSIM was a separate chip. I somehow thought it was just a function of the TPM.
Heleana 4y ago
It looks like this is going to happen eventually, especially since eSIMs are already available and manufacturers will likely appreciate having fewer components to deal with.
londons_explore 4y ago
I don't see why this needs to be dedicated silicon at all... Why not simply a Trustzone-like sandbox for all the code and data necessary for the sim? Then the actual processing is done on the main application processor, and there is no physical device at all. I assume carriers would want the user not to be able to inspect or extract the internals of the sim (logic, keys, etc), but most platforms already provide some way to do that for other purposes (DRM, secure boot).
kwanbix 4y ago
An now we are full circle. I remember the first cellphones had no SIM. You had to give the serial to the telephone company and they will activate your line in that cellphone. SIMs where supposed to be freedom to move your line whenever you wanted. Now we are back at the cellphone is the SIM card.
- lxgr 4y ago
  > Now we are back at the cellphone is the SIM card. No, because the eSIM provisioning process, as well as eSIM profiles themselves, are standardized, down to how the activation code is represented in a QR code. SIM-less CDMA phone provisioning was never that flexible, as far as I know. Of course, providers can make this as easy or hard as they want to (e.g. by not allowing the reuse of activation codes, tying activation codes to an IMEI, having an allowlist of supported phone models despite eSIM being a standard etc.), but they can already do much of that for physical SIMs as well.
mikece 4y ago
Does iSIM allow having multiple iSIM accounts loaded on a phone? For someone who travels a lot a great feature of eSIM is that I can load several accounts onto one device and then select which eSIM I need based on where I am for business. If iSIM doesn't allow this then it's a massive step backward.
connectsnk 4y ago
For those who clicked just to understand what the heck is an iSim : Rather than a chip on the motherboard, iSIMs are integrated directly onto the SoC.
kotaKat 4y ago
When can I provision my own eSIM/iSIMs? GSMA has a massive monopoly on the market preventing me from being able to provision my own SIM applications into the iSIM/eSIM because they have a certificate chain you must follow. I'm working with private LTE networks at such small scale that I need to provision eSIMs for a handful of users and literally no eSIM provider that's been GSMA blessed will work with us.
xyst 4y ago
So if the iSIM goes bad or stops functioning. Instead of replacing the SIM or eSIM chip. Now you have to replace the entire SoC because of one faulty component. Good for phone designers (as mentioned, more space for other components). Amazing for phone manufacturers because it pushes more units when a device goes bad. Bad for consumers because repairability is significantly reduced. Terrible for the environment.
- camillomiller 4y ago
  It is an extremely simple chip and right now it is integrated into the motherboard of any phone. This would make sense if the eSim component was an easily swappable element, which it isn't. Sorry but this critique holds no water. I would even add that, if anything, eSims and iSIMs would probably lower the environmental impact of Sim Cards, which are physical pieces of plastic that are produced (with CO-2 emissions) and shipped (with CO-2 emissions), and also contribute to plastic pollution, as they get shipped in credit-card sized plastic holders that are mostly trash as soon as you get a minuscule nano-SIM out of them.
- dmix 4y ago
  How is this different than any other thing used in an SoC? Do you just not like SoCs?
- lxgr 4y ago
  Are you aware of any phone (released in the last 10-15 years) where it was possible to exchange faulty components, soldered onto a PCB, in the first place?
rvz 4y ago
> We did, but iSIM is better than eSIM. No it isn't. Said no-one but paid Qualcomm shillers.
grishka 4y ago
I get all the objections, but — eSIM is extremely convenient for traveling, when you just want data in another country. You can have many of them stored in your phone and activate them as needed if you travel a lot. You also get dual-SIM on most devices so you don't have to carry a second phone for your domestic number. I'd never replace my actual SIM with one though. I can't bring myself to trust software this much.
- jaywalk 4y ago
  I've been SIM-free for a while now. It Just Works™
  - grishka 4y ago
    All these software-that's-easier-in-hardware things Just Work™ until they don't. Bluetooth also works 99% of the time, the remaining 1% makes you want to yeet the damn thing at a wall in frustration. That's why I have trust issues with this stuff.
- nobrains 4y ago
  I do the opposite. eSim for my primary sim. And then the sim for travelling sims, as not all countries or not all providers in those countries have esims. And if they do then esim it is. Otherwise the free sim slot is available for a physical sim.
bogwog 4y ago
Imagine how many more patents Qualcomm could fit into your phone by removing that ~2.5mm chip!
throw7 4y ago
Man, what I as a consumer wants is to be able to have multiple cell phones on the same number... just like I used to have with a landline. This isim is just esim, except on the soc. And before anyone says just use google voice... no I don't want to use google. I don't want to deal with google. I don't want an abstraction.
- lxgr 4y ago
  Is this not offered by US carriers? In Germany I remember it being pretty common. All phones on one "line" will ring at the same time, but only one will receive incoming texts, unfortunately, due to how SMS is implemented at the network level.
  - throw7 4y ago
    Not in the US, except someone in the thread mentioned ATT has a carrier specific feature... which is interesting, but it's not universal. You mentioned SMS... it's also annoying that RCS doesn't seem to support multiple clients/syncing of texts/voicemail/phone. I mean, you spent all that time developing/deploying the "next-gen" SMS and then just drop the ball.
- zamadatix 4y ago
  Wearables kind of pushed carriers to support this on consumer plans recently e.g. ATT calls it "numbersync" https://www.att.com/features/numbersync/ https://www.att.com/features/numbersync/.
- dharrison27 4y ago
  Also some of us just can't get Google Voice. Like in Canada.
nimish 4y ago
iSIMs aren’t new. Sony Altair has had them in the IOT lte modem space for a while
flemhans 4y ago
Why is it so hard to find a 4G/5G USB modem with eSIM support? Or a hat for a Raspberry Pi? Those that I found, are for MFF2 UICC chips, basically just a soldered on SIM card. And eUICC, which seemed to be the way to go, still requires that you pick one carrier to provision the settings with. How does e.g. Apple get around this?
ravagat 4y ago
Reads like a PR move tbh. Anyway I don't like this push for eSIMs/virtual SIMs. I like to cycle my SIM and phone number every couple of years to refresh and an added bonus of this is to refine my rolodex of contacts and rekindle contact with some lesser-maintained relationships. Makes my life a little better whenever I refresh.

116 points by laktak 4y ago

eSIMs are less convenient and less flexible than regular SIM cards - will iSIMs be any different? How many iSIMs will a phone support? Will they support dual iSIMs or triple iSIMs so I can use one mobile number for work, another for my personal life and a third to use when I'm travelling overseas and want to avoid expensive roaming charges?

MrBuddyCasino 4y ago
At least on the iPhone you can add many and activate two simultaneously. Most phones weren’t dual-sim!
- mschuster91 4y ago
  Dual-SIM phones were the hot shit for years when phones were beginning to take off. I remember some weird adapters that cycled through SIMs when the phone was restarted and all kinds of other hacks.
  - gambiting 4y ago
    I mean, all top end Samsungs are proper dual SIM phones still(they take two physical Sims). #1 reason why I'm still buying them and not any other brand. iPhones also support dual SIM but only with one physical card and one eSIM.
    - pmontra 4y ago
      Also not top end ones. Example, the Samsung A40, a mid range sub 300 EUR phone. There is plenty of space for SIMs in nowadays' ridiculously sized phones.
  - coretx 4y ago
    You don't even need Dual-SIM phones, contemporary SIM can contain various numbers/administrations. Both with and without hackery involved. It's just that the carriers don't want it / block it. This is also why many of them outright refuse to sell phones with dual SIM capability.
    - mschuster91 4y ago
      > This is also why many of them outright refuse to sell phones with dual SIM capability. At least here in the EU, carriers don't follow typical US customs any more... a series of court verdicts following the 2005 commerce directive has all but eliminated SIM locking and other hostile practices by carriers, the worst you (unfortunately) still get is bloatware.
- MisterSandman 4y ago
  Which is awesome, but it also means that dual-sim capabilities is completely software based. In 10-20 years, could this be part of a subscribption, or be disabled by certain carriers who don't want you to use a cheaper data plan along with their sim?
  - MrBuddyCasino 4y ago
    They could have demanded this from physical dual-sim models as well. There is always some kind of software involved.
jplona 4y ago
Why are eSIMs less convenient for you? In all of the interactions I've had, eSIM works without issue and right away. Most of the times I've needed a physical SIM card I've had to wait for it to be mailed or plan a trip to a physical store, or the old one is the wrong size and I need a new one or an adapter.
- gambiting 4y ago
  I can swap sims in about 30 seconds. With eSim I need to ask my carrier for a new eSim registration code to be generated which takes 48 hours. It's insane and I have no idea why we agreed to this standard.
  - IshKebab 4y ago
    Sounds like an issue with your carrier rather than the eSIM standard. I recently went to Europe and was able to buy a cheap data eSIM (1GB for £2) and activate it in the airport basically instantly. With SIMs I would have had to order it through the post like a week in advance, and there's no way I would have gotten that price. eSIMs are amazingly convenient for travelling: https://esimdb.com/ https://esimdb.com/
  - jplona 4y ago
    I think "insane" is a strong characterization. I swap SIMs every couple of years, so a delay of 48h is well within the scope of planning for such an event. Additionally, I happened to do an eSIM swap today and it took about an hour. For some use cases it's more convenient than a physical card, for some use cases (or implementations) it's less convenient. That doesn't make it insane.
- i_love_cookies 4y ago
  at&t refuses to give me a esim for the pixel6 i bought though them on the same account the concept itself is fine the implementation is a downgrade since it gives the carriers more control
  - roneythomas6 4y ago
asimpletune 4y ago
I’m not sure what you’re talking about. I know people who traveled for months, and they have half a dozen eSIMs on their phone. When they enter one of those countries, they just toggle the sim to active and it’s good to go. They do this all the while having a USA physical sim as well. This on iPhone btw.
- zarzavat 4y ago
  Okay but how do you get local prices if there is no local eSIM? The best you can hope for is a travel SIM which may be multiple times more expensive than a local SIM.
  - asimpletune 4y ago
    If you can’t find one then i guess you can’t get local prices, but I’ve never had a problem getting an esim, including in Albania and Turkey. You just go to the a carrier store and you ask, scan a QR code, and you’re done. Most of the time the big cities that you would arrive in anyways will have them.
krzyk 4y ago
eSIMs are more convenient - few days ago I changed carriers, and it was done just on the phone - I didn't have to go to physical store, I didn't had to wait for the SIM card to arrive by mail. The only issue I can see is that I can't take that card out and put it in a USB modem to use in my router. But I have seperate SIM for that, that has cheaper data plan than my ordinary phone.

ipv6ipv4 4y ago

Why isn't this a bit of generic software that can run on anything?

kube-system 4y ago
As I understand, it’s because they also have some physical security concerns. They operate kind of like a secure enclave I guess.
- astrange 4y ago
  It's a "secure element" which is almost exactly like a "secure enclave". NFC payments also use them.
  - fsckboy 4y ago
    but who is it secured from tampering, and secured to protect whom? The carriers? the customer? the NSA? Qualcomm? for encryption? for signing? ID/auth? "auth" of the above?
bilekas 4y ago
It's a physical storage about the carrier. as far as i understand it's more convenient for carriers to onboard clients and also for users in general if a phone dies for example you can swap it into another. There are CDMA enabled phones that do not need a SIM card but they're a pain to transfer to another carrier. At least today.
- vasco 4y ago
  I don't need to swap a physical thing to log into my bank on another phone if my main one dies. I'm not sure why this is the answer.
  - bilekas 4y ago
    But imagine you have 2FA sms verification (horrible practice but prevalent) and your phone is dead. Sim swap out is helpful. I don't approve of it personally, but it's a legacy method anyway.

chamakits 4y ago

This seems like an inevitability; since eSIMs are already here, and manufacturers are going to be thrilled to have fewer moving parts. But it’s disappointing all round. I absolutely love how easy it is for me to buy a new phone, swap in my old SIM and I’m instantly using my old number. As painful as transferring everything else is with new phones, at least I easily keep the same number. With this (and I’d guess with eSIM too) I just have to hope that their process to transfer SIMs work flawlessly. And I have very little confidence in that. Sidenote: also disappointed this gets published uncritically as if published by the phone manufacturers themselves, celebrating this as a pure positive instead of the trade off it is.

MisterSandman 4y ago
I feel like this is gearing up to bring back contracts or phone locks, in a way. A family member recently bought an iPhone from the US to a non-US country, without realizing that the US models are eSim-only. They have to change carriers because only the fancy, expensive carriers offer eSim. I would not be surprised if they find other ways to make it harder to install an eSim in a different carriers phone. Also, another thing I hate about having an eSim is that it sorta forces you to install your carriers app, which for some cheap/mid-tier carriers is an ad-infested mess.
godzillabrennus 4y ago
SIM cards were never swappable for me. They were locked to a phone. Changing to a new handset meant going to the carriers store or having them ship me one. I welcome the ease of portability that eSIM brings.
- secondcoming 4y ago
  In order to test various 5G offerings, I have 3 SIM cards at the moment. All are freely swappable between my phone and my 5G router.
- LeoPanthera 4y ago
  This feels like an American perspective. In Europe (and Asia too?), sim-swapping is pretty seamless, and relatively common.

bilekas 4y ago

I feel really old thinking that i remember the model of sim cards that were credit card size and not shown in the diagram.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
kube-system 4y ago
You still get them in that format (but breakaway into smaller formats) if you buy a bring-your-own-sim kit from many carriers.
- jraph 4y ago
  Where? Here you can get the "breakaway into smaller formats" thing but not credit-card sized, the biggest size is Mini SIM.
  - somat 4y ago
    All the sims I have ever received(US) come as a credit card sized item(looks like a smart card) and you break out the size you need. (sim, mini sim, micro sim)
  - gambiting 4y ago
    Here in UK you get that from most carriers.
  - kube-system 4y ago
    Any US carrier, in my experience. https://www.flyamz.com/storage/2020/03/USA-SIM-Card-New-ATT-Bulk-Blank-Sim-Card-4G-LTE-3-IN-1-Standard-Micro-Nano-Unactivated-Empty-card-1-600x612.png https://www.flyamz.com/storage/2020/03/USA-SIM-Card-New-ATT-... https://images5.tanganetwork.com/prod?bucket=tanga-fetched-images-prod&filename=78f2dc94d0131ccaa0540024.jpeg&width=700&height=700&quality=90 https://images5.tanganetwork.com/prod?bucket=tanga-fetched-i... https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/61bYyPhpYoL._AC_SL1200_.jpg https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/61bYyPhpYoL._AC_SL1200_....

jjtheblunt 4y ago

This looks like paid Qualcomm PR, for the following reason. From the article, it looks a lot like Qualcomm trying to coopt the eSIM success now a few years old, by saying the electronics of iSIM are a custom block in their silicon, not a separate small chip. But it doesn't clarify that others (like Apple obviously) can't realize their eSIMs in their custom SOC, as far as i see. > Qualcomm says "the new iSIM is fully compliant with the GSMA Remote SIM Provisioning standard; meaning its subscriptions are remotely manageable through any standard platforms." That's the same standard as eSIM, and it's held to all the same security requirements, so theoretically, any carrier that works with eSIM shouldn't see a difference between an eSIM and an iSIM. iSIM is still just a hunk of silicon that needs software provisioning—where the silicon lives shouldn't really matter to your carrier.

bjackman 4y ago
Yeah AFAICT this article is just: Qualcomm is now a certified producer of eSIMs. They put them in the SoC. Everything else including the term "iSIM" just seems to be marketing cruft? Perhaps I'm missing some detail but it seems the only people who would have any reason to care about this would be Qualcomm's customers in the mobile OEM space.
- coretx 4y ago
  Because it's in software, they can legally disable your phone and force you to buy a new phone every 3 year citing "security patches no longer being issued". Bye bye aftermarket firmware second life !
  - franga2000 4y ago
    They could be doing this already if they wanted to. I agree they shouldn't have this ability in the first place, but this doesn't change anything.
    - kuschku 4y ago
      They can't do that with physical SIMs, because at least in the EU, there are regulations against that (to regulate stuff like phones and SIMs locked to each other)

shalmanese 4y ago

Can anyone explain why eSIM was the stopgap solution and we didn't go straight from physical SIM to iSIM? What special requirements does a SIM card have that it was easier to put it on a seperate chip? Now that we've moved to iSIM, does this remove the artificial limitation on the number of SIMs a phone can support? Can I buy a phone in 2030 and load it up with 50 different PAYG SIM cards?

kramerger 4y ago
My guess is that the French SIM companies put all kind of artificial limitations on esim so they could keep their marketshare and continue earning money on licensing and patents
- coretx 4y ago
  It's not only french companies producing them and the entities who are involved in pushing SIM replacements aren't as interested in mundane things such as marketshare, money etc. as you might think. Don't forget this one for example: https://theintercept.com/2015/02/19/great-sim-heist/ https://theintercept.com/2015/02/19/great-sim-heist/ I don't think the french abuse their SIM-powerposition, otherwise they would not force states like Palestine into using weaker encryption and such.
  - kramerger 4y ago
    We are discussing two completely different issues :) If you ever worked in telecom, you know for the fact that the SIM companies have sabotaged and vetoed every attempt to get a sane eSIM or SIM-free standard. And nothing against the French :) , it just happens that the two largest and most agreesive companies in this area have French connections (Thales and Gemalto)
    - coretx 4y ago
      No denial from my side there, but regarding the other point: what else do those two have in common with each other ? Sometimes things really are what they look like.

squarefoot 4y ago

I'll see this as a good move only if it can be fully supported by FOSS operating systems, otherwise it becomes just another tool to lock in users to closed platforms.

Uptrenda 4y ago

Wasn't one of the benefits of a smart card model was having a totally isolated chip that could run minimal software and provide a limited surface for attack? If you add everything to the same chip then doesn't this reduce the advantages of having that separate smart card (together with it's anti-tampering design)? We're also supposed to trust Qualcomm that this is secure... Sounds totally legit. SIM cards aren't perfect but I feel like there is a benefit to them. Especially since they use the same tech as credit card chips, don't they (universal integrated circuit cards.) It's hard for me to want to trust this as much as a platform used by literally every consumer payment bank and carrier out there vs Qualcomms priority spec. I think anyone who does secure communication already doesn't want to touch Qualcomm products because you can't audit their designs. Unfortunately, that's usually what is shipped as the baseband modem in most phones... A single company making one of the most important communication products... Nope, no problem there...

audunw 4y ago
I haven't worked on iSIM myself, but I have colleagues that work on integrating iSIM onto an SoC. The procedure around integrating an iSIM into an SoC is ridiculously strict. The integration and simulation has to happen on a workstation in a special room, not connected to the rest of the network, with camera surveillance, etc. > We're also supposed to trust Qualcomm that this is secure I don't know if Qualcomm can do things differently. I don't know if they can design the iSIM themselves instead of integrating from a trusted third party. But I doubt that the security requirement is any less strict. Telecom operators seem to be extremely paranoid about this stuff. Essentially, it seems like it's not that much different from eSIM, you're just putting a similar kind of trusted module on the SoC instead of on the PCB. > together with it's anti-tampering design I'd be very surprised if iSIM and the whole Qualcomm SoC isn't designed with anti-tampering mechanisms. Seems like anti-tampering is becoming a general requirement for SoCs (with upgradable firmware and root-of-trust) being designed now.
zamadatix 4y ago
Ultimately the weakest link in SIM security is the support rep at your telephony provider.
4y ago

eloisant 4y ago

Something I don't understand: why eSIM or iSIM have to be hardware, why can't it be pure software, some credentials stored on the storage of the phone?

can16358p 4y ago
That's why I think too. We have secure enclave and all that for anything cryptographically secure and isolated. Just interface with that for the keystore/signing and have everything in software. A possible attack vector? Perhaps if something's not coded correctly... which can easily be fixed with software update. I'm sure there's more into this of course, but that should be the general motivation.

can16358p 4y ago

TBH I didn't know eSIM was some physical extra hardware albeit small. I'm surprised that eSIM isn't what iSIM is in the first place: some negligible module inside the IC.

_8j50 4y ago

Oh well I guess I should plan on stopping the usage of smartphones in a few years and start calling my congressman and lobbying to have laws that allow me to function in society without a smartphone. I hated eSIMs but at least I could solder them off like bluetooth,gps or even wifi sometimes for some devices like the kindle paper (I just upload books to it with USB). I know there is market demand for laptops with hardware key switches and that are pro-privacy but how big or competitive is it? I want to make disconnected versions of products. From TVs to appliances, home automation, camera systems and smart phones (of course not on my own lol). I call this vision of products "smarter technology", because my goal is not to reduce functionality or features but to engineer products in a smarter way that does not require internet connectivity (but in some cases a hardware switch can enable network/radio connectivity. I am desparately searching for products like this these days. An IP camera that is effectively PoE powered but acts like a webcam for your desktop when you set it up that way or with a mini-dvr that will stream it locally via wifi/ethernet or optionally through a paid cloud subscription (profit $$$). I want that. A car with a hardware button to turn off connectivity features but also has all the cool modern car features that don't need network connectivity and a fully manual driving mode with optionally replacable batteries (replace them in seconds instead of wait in a queue and charge after an hour) A TV where you can remove the builtin computer and it can still display hdmi,displayport,etc... and you can reprogram it as you wish. A phone that can only make calls and stream display input via BLE or other radio from an optional computer that it can physically get attached to, but you can also take this optional computer with you and connect it to a wireless dock to use it as a desktop or laptop or to interface/manage your home automation and security. I would prefer to donate to someone else to get them to do all this but if the market is strong enough, I don't mind making a lot of money doing it myself either.

DeathArrow 4y ago

Why is this a positive story? Downsides: -it is more cumbersome to replace phones, as you have to move identities from phone to phone and get approvals by carriers and device makers instead of just replacing the physical SIM -you can't just hand over your phone to someone else, you have to unroll yourself and enroll the other person -you don't have anonymity and privacy since is no longer possible to use a prepaid physical SIM And what are the advantages? Cost savings of maybe $1 for a pohone that costs over $1000?

pilif 4y ago
> it is more cumbersome to replace phones, as you have to move identities from phone to phone and get approvals by carriers and device makers instead of just replacing the physical SIM That really depends on the carrier. In my case, setting up a new iPhone to replace an old one means saying yes in the prompt displayed by the phone. Nothing else. This is more convenient than having to search for the SIM removal tool. > -you can't just hand over your phone to someone else, you have to unroll yourself and enroll the other person For me this is a big feature because I would never hand my phone to somebody else, but an attacker is very likely to remove the SIM card and put it into their phone. Now suddenly many 2FA accounts are protected by a 4 digit PIN rather than my 20 digit phone passphrase. > -you don't have anonymity and privacy since is no longer possible to use a prepaid physical SIM It works exactly the same way as it did with physical SIM cards only the physical card is replaced by a QR code displayed on a screen or a printed paper. If the carrier sells anonymous prepaid SIM cards, nothing prevents them from selling anonymous prepaid QR codes.
- goosedragons 4y ago
  How much more complicated and annoying is the process if you're going iPhone to Android or Android to iPhone? You take the SIM card out before handing it someone else.
  - pilif 4y ago
    you scan the QR code with your android phone. That will cause your existing phone to be unregistered. What eSIM does is turn the physical smart card into a QR code which can be shown on a screen in addition to being printed on a piece of physical paper.

zx8080 4y ago

If I understand it correctly, it's not possible to switch esim to another phone in two scenarious: - dead battery in the current esim holder phone - no internet - crashed or somehow broken esim holder phone The worst thing is that it probably won't be even possible to buy anything since banks tend to tie 2nd payment factor to phone (notifications) or sms. Complete lock up is very possible. I won't use esim as much as possible at all.

camillomiller 4y ago
That is incorrect. Carriers hold the provisioning power on the esim. They can easily send you a new QR code after invalidating the previous esim in the dead or stolen phone. It’s literally a procedure that takes a few seconds. Many providers here in Europe already have automated web based interfaces in place for that, or a dedicated customer support pathway/process. Some are trying to turn this into a paid-for service and that’s of course not acceptable. The scenarios you describe are all taken into account. It’s much more of a hassle to deal with physical sims in the scenario of a destroyed, stolen or lost phone. In terms of privacy nothing changes. Most country require a full scale ID procedure to emit and assign a sim. That’s the same for esims and physical sims. What changes for carriers right now is that they have to recoup the investment on the esim management infrastructure and that’s why, at least initially, the friction will come from having to pay for esim-related services that should be free.
ezfe 4y ago
While in some cases you need to transfer the eSIM, you can also just as easily provision a new eSIM - ex. on Visible, you'd just download the app to your new phone, sign in, and tap install eSIM button.

Idiot_in_Vain 4y ago

Wonder if QC holds any iSIM related patents, that will prevent their competition from offering iSIMs.

freeAgent 4y ago
I don’t see much real difference to an end user between an eSIM and an “iSIM.” iSIM seems to me just to be Qualcomm’s name for their own eSIM solution that will come in the same package as their SoCs. There may be an extremely small power-savings to be had, but that’s probably easily overwhelmed by other aspects of the phone hardware and software.

martyvis 4y ago

TIL that an eSIM was a separate chip. I somehow thought it was just a function of the TPM.

Heleana 4y ago

It looks like this is going to happen eventually, especially since eSIMs are already available and manufacturers will likely appreciate having fewer components to deal with.

londons_explore 4y ago

I don't see why this needs to be dedicated silicon at all... Why not simply a Trustzone-like sandbox for all the code and data necessary for the sim? Then the actual processing is done on the main application processor, and there is no physical device at all. I assume carriers would want the user not to be able to inspect or extract the internals of the sim (logic, keys, etc), but most platforms already provide some way to do that for other purposes (DRM, secure boot).

kwanbix 4y ago

An now we are full circle. I remember the first cellphones had no SIM. You had to give the serial to the telephone company and they will activate your line in that cellphone. SIMs where supposed to be freedom to move your line whenever you wanted. Now we are back at the cellphone is the SIM card.

lxgr 4y ago
> Now we are back at the cellphone is the SIM card. No, because the eSIM provisioning process, as well as eSIM profiles themselves, are standardized, down to how the activation code is represented in a QR code. SIM-less CDMA phone provisioning was never that flexible, as far as I know. Of course, providers can make this as easy or hard as they want to (e.g. by not allowing the reuse of activation codes, tying activation codes to an IMEI, having an allowlist of supported phone models despite eSIM being a standard etc.), but they can already do much of that for physical SIMs as well.

mikece 4y ago

Does iSIM allow having multiple iSIM accounts loaded on a phone? For someone who travels a lot a great feature of eSIM is that I can load several accounts onto one device and then select which eSIM I need based on where I am for business. If iSIM doesn't allow this then it's a massive step backward.

connectsnk 4y ago

For those who clicked just to understand what the heck is an iSim : Rather than a chip on the motherboard, iSIMs are integrated directly onto the SoC.

kotaKat 4y ago

When can I provision my own eSIM/iSIMs? GSMA has a massive monopoly on the market preventing me from being able to provision my own SIM applications into the iSIM/eSIM because they have a certificate chain you must follow. I'm working with private LTE networks at such small scale that I need to provision eSIMs for a handful of users and literally no eSIM provider that's been GSMA blessed will work with us.

xyst 4y ago

So if the iSIM goes bad or stops functioning. Instead of replacing the SIM or eSIM chip. Now you have to replace the entire SoC because of one faulty component. Good for phone designers (as mentioned, more space for other components). Amazing for phone manufacturers because it pushes more units when a device goes bad. Bad for consumers because repairability is significantly reduced. Terrible for the environment.

camillomiller 4y ago
It is an extremely simple chip and right now it is integrated into the motherboard of any phone. This would make sense if the eSim component was an easily swappable element, which it isn't. Sorry but this critique holds no water. I would even add that, if anything, eSims and iSIMs would probably lower the environmental impact of Sim Cards, which are physical pieces of plastic that are produced (with CO-2 emissions) and shipped (with CO-2 emissions), and also contribute to plastic pollution, as they get shipped in credit-card sized plastic holders that are mostly trash as soon as you get a minuscule nano-SIM out of them.
dmix 4y ago
How is this different than any other thing used in an SoC? Do you just not like SoCs?
lxgr 4y ago
Are you aware of any phone (released in the last 10-15 years) where it was possible to exchange faulty components, soldered onto a PCB, in the first place?

rvz 4y ago

> We did, but iSIM is better than eSIM. No it isn't. Said no-one but paid Qualcomm shillers.

grishka 4y ago

I get all the objections, but — eSIM is extremely convenient for traveling, when you just want data in another country. You can have many of them stored in your phone and activate them as needed if you travel a lot. You also get dual-SIM on most devices so you don't have to carry a second phone for your domestic number. I'd never replace my actual SIM with one though. I can't bring myself to trust software this much.

jaywalk 4y ago
I've been SIM-free for a while now. It Just Works™
- grishka 4y ago
  All these software-that's-easier-in-hardware things Just Work™ until they don't. Bluetooth also works 99% of the time, the remaining 1% makes you want to yeet the damn thing at a wall in frustration. That's why I have trust issues with this stuff.
nobrains 4y ago
I do the opposite. eSim for my primary sim. And then the sim for travelling sims, as not all countries or not all providers in those countries have esims. And if they do then esim it is. Otherwise the free sim slot is available for a physical sim.

bogwog 4y ago

Imagine how many more patents Qualcomm could fit into your phone by removing that ~2.5mm chip!

throw7 4y ago

Man, what I as a consumer wants is to be able to have multiple cell phones on the same number... just like I used to have with a landline. This isim is just esim, except on the soc. And before anyone says just use google voice... no I don't want to use google. I don't want to deal with google. I don't want an abstraction.

lxgr 4y ago
Is this not offered by US carriers? In Germany I remember it being pretty common. All phones on one "line" will ring at the same time, but only one will receive incoming texts, unfortunately, due to how SMS is implemented at the network level.
- throw7 4y ago
  Not in the US, except someone in the thread mentioned ATT has a carrier specific feature... which is interesting, but it's not universal. You mentioned SMS... it's also annoying that RCS doesn't seem to support multiple clients/syncing of texts/voicemail/phone. I mean, you spent all that time developing/deploying the "next-gen" SMS and then just drop the ball.
zamadatix 4y ago
Wearables kind of pushed carriers to support this on consumer plans recently e.g. ATT calls it "numbersync" https://www.att.com/features/numbersync/ https://www.att.com/features/numbersync/.
dharrison27 4y ago
Also some of us just can't get Google Voice. Like in Canada.

nimish 4y ago

iSIMs aren’t new. Sony Altair has had them in the IOT lte modem space for a while

flemhans 4y ago

Why is it so hard to find a 4G/5G USB modem with eSIM support? Or a hat for a Raspberry Pi? Those that I found, are for MFF2 UICC chips, basically just a soldered on SIM card. And eUICC, which seemed to be the way to go, still requires that you pick one carrier to provision the settings with. How does e.g. Apple get around this?

ravagat 4y ago

Reads like a PR move tbh. Anyway I don't like this push for eSIMs/virtual SIMs. I like to cycle my SIM and phone number every couple of years to refresh and an added bonus of this is to refine my rolodex of contacts and rekindle contact with some lesser-maintained relationships. Makes my life a little better whenever I refresh.