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Is there any effort towards enabling increased privacy against tracking by "rotating" eSIMs amongst a group of individuals? The article mentions capacity for 50

Is there any effort towards enabling increased privacy against tracking by "rotating" eSIMs amongst a group of individuals? The article mentions capacity for 50 profiles, what would be the legal and/or implementation effects of such a Local-Profile-Agent?

gruez 2y ago
You can't transfer eSIMs between devices. iPhones support "transfers" but in reality it involves the carrier reissuing it. You'd have to transfer the physical device, which is going to be a pain.
- miohtama 2y ago
  AFAIK Only the eSIM issuer can do this. I did it once, it involved the eSIM issuer support emailing me a new QR code.
- maxloh 2y ago
  What prevents you from doing that? Is an activated eSIM linked to the device's MAC address, making it impossible to use with a different device? If that is the case, what would happen if we transferred the MAC address along with the eSIM? (assuming you have a jailbroken/rooted phone)
  - gruez 2y ago
    >Is an activated eSIM linked to the device's MAC address, making it impossible to use with a different device? After an esim is "activated" it's bound to the esim chip. By design, you can't copy it onto another esim chip or device. If you want to transfer devices, you need to ask your carrier to issue you another esim.
    - Gormo 2y ago
      What if you use a solution like the one described in the article, and physically swap the SIM card to another device?
      - lxgr 2y ago
        That should work, as "physical eSIMs" are usually not bound to the device they're in in any way. Your provider might restrict the set of allowable IMEIs conencting per SIM (profile), though.
- lxgr 2y ago
  That's not quite true: Some eSIM profiles can be reinstalled, sometimes only on the same device, sometimes only on a limited number of devices or a limited number of times, but sometimes they're really as versatile as the physical SIMs they're replacing. It's ultimately up to the provider which model they choose, but I really like the ones that allow both reuse of an existing profile and make it easy and free to provision a new one if required (e.g. due to a lost or broken device).

gruez 2y ago

You can't transfer eSIMs between devices. iPhones support "transfers" but in reality it involves the carrier reissuing it. You'd have to transfer the physical device, which is going to be a pain.

miohtama 2y ago
AFAIK Only the eSIM issuer can do this. I did it once, it involved the eSIM issuer support emailing me a new QR code.
maxloh 2y ago
What prevents you from doing that? Is an activated eSIM linked to the device's MAC address, making it impossible to use with a different device? If that is the case, what would happen if we transferred the MAC address along with the eSIM? (assuming you have a jailbroken/rooted phone)
- gruez 2y ago
  >Is an activated eSIM linked to the device's MAC address, making it impossible to use with a different device? After an esim is "activated" it's bound to the esim chip. By design, you can't copy it onto another esim chip or device. If you want to transfer devices, you need to ask your carrier to issue you another esim.
  - Gormo 2y ago
    What if you use a solution like the one described in the article, and physically swap the SIM card to another device?
    - lxgr 2y ago
      That should work, as "physical eSIMs" are usually not bound to the device they're in in any way. Your provider might restrict the set of allowable IMEIs conencting per SIM (profile), though.
lxgr 2y ago
That's not quite true: Some eSIM profiles can be reinstalled, sometimes only on the same device, sometimes only on a limited number of devices or a limited number of times, but sometimes they're really as versatile as the physical SIMs they're replacing. It's ultimately up to the provider which model they choose, but I really like the ones that allow both reuse of an existing profile and make it easy and free to provision a new one if required (e.g. due to a lost or broken device).