3 ms·

Title should read "I had to switch to eSim [...]" well yeah, of course esim is shitty, as is everything imposed by big tech monopolies to their users without c

by shlip 10mo ago

Title should read "I had to switch to eSim [...]" well yeah, of course esim is shitty, as is everything imposed by big tech monopolies to their users without consulting or caring about what they really want. Did you think they were here for your wellbeing and not the money ?

ACCount37 10mo ago
eSIM is specifically designed to deny user freedom. They are impossible to transfer from device to device by design, for one. Every single "transfer" has to be approved and signed off by a cellular provider in an online mode. They can deny it at will, or just neglect implementing it, and you can do nothing at all. It's pretty clear that when GSMA talks of "security", they mean "security of the business models". What does that mean for the users? It means they're getting fucked.
- bcye 10mo ago
  What would be the use case for that?
  - ACCount37 10mo ago
    What would be the use case of being able to transfer a SIM card from one device to another at will, you mean? What kind of question is that.
    - ashray 10mo ago
      I'll post an example for the parent just in case they are honestly confused about use cases. Here is one that happened to me. I had an eSIM on my iPhone. My iPhone broke (screen became somewhat unusable, and the phone was stuck in a restarting loop). It was an older model phone so I checked the repair cost and thought I'd rather buy a new one. Bought a new phone. Now, to transfer my eSIM from the old phone to the new phone, I needed the carrier to approve. But I was away from my home country and on roaming. So I tried to call them. They needed me to use a verification PIN they would send via SMS on the old phone, to verify the transfer to the new one. Impossible since the old phone is unusable. Back in the day, I'd have just taken out the sim from the old phone and moved it to the new one. Easy peasy. The only other option in this case now was to visit one of their stores thousands of miles away. Eventually just ended up doing that when I returned weeks later but during this time I could not access several services due to lack of access to my number plus 2 factor codes being sent there. Moving a sim from phone to phone was seamless. Now the carrier needs to approve this swap. Even with two working phones sometimes it's a hassle and there will be delays while carriers decide to approve the move. There is a new feature that allows you to transfer eSIMs easily between phones but carriers seem to be holding onto their power in this regard and not every carrier will let their sims move so easily. This possibly requires regulators to step in and solve the issue - make it up to the user to move eSIMs. I would count on the EU to make this easier at some point. On the plus side, eSIMs are nice to be able to signup and provision them through an app. Helps with travel and roaming. So there's that too.
      - coderatlarge 10mo ago
        this carrier approval to move esim problem is more generalized on modern “smartphones”. unless you opt in to cloud providers holding your data there is no easy way afaik to migrate your authenticator apps to another phone. and a host of other authentication/authorization data is tied to the device in an opaque way. don’t get me started on apple’s unpredictable model of sending 2fa to some other “trusted” device which means tou never know what tou need to bring with you.
        AlexandrB 10mo ago
        Google authenticator lets you move accounts easily using a QR code + phone camera.
        tscherno 10mo ago
        But no way to backup to cold storage last time I checked. Took a picture of the QR code with another phone and printed it.
        thaumasiotes 10mo ago
        > Took a picture of the QR code with another phone and printed it. Why? Decode the QR code and store the text however you prefer to store text.
        coderatlarge 10mo ago
        i wish there were a straightforward way to export a file of some sort that i can backup without creating yet another special case to manage.
        coderatlarge 10mo ago
        that’s good to know thanks but creates more special cases to manage if i just want to backup my stuff so i can manually recover when i need to (on lost device say).
    - sroussey 10mo ago
      Probably one most people never ask, though should be obvious to those on this forum.
- waweic 10mo ago
  esim.me, 9esim and "sysmocom eUICC for eSIM" are eSIMs in the SIM card form factor that you can load the SIM profiles onto and use them in any device with a SIM card slot (and of course transfer between devices). In my opinion, that's the best of both worlds.
  - ACCount37 10mo ago
    It's good, but they're expensive as fuck for what they are. The best option would be a software-only eSIM with full transfer support, IMO. But we don't have that, because GSMA says we can't have nice things.
    - mbirth 10mo ago
      > It's good, but they're expensive as fuck for what they are. Yep, I remember a time where you could extract the Ki and IMSI from legit SIMs and write that to a bog standard Goldwafer card (which were also used for cable TV hacking) including some SIM emulation software and thereby clone the SIM. That was like 30 years ago and the only thing that changed in SIMs since then is better encryption.
      - ACCount37 10mo ago
        If you had the relevant keys? You wouldn't even need a blank card. You could just make a software emulator and force the smartphone modem to use it. The obvious issue being: it's pretty hard to acquire raw key material. Most vendors refuse to sell it, and the workarounds are messy.
onesociety2022 10mo ago
If what you say is true, why would Apple ever force a switch to eSIM? I’m now less likely to buy a new iPhone because I don’t want to deal with this eSIM fiasco. It’s to their detriment. If their goal is to sell more phones, they would want to eliminate all friction to switch to a new phone. So what you are saying doesn’t add up.
- FireBeyond 10mo ago
  Less space occupied, more battery, smaller phones. It wasn't the only reason, but was at least one of the stated reasons for the jack removal.
  - mbirth 10mo ago
    They also promoted this with the iPhone 17 eSIM-only variant. More space for battery.

by shlip 10mo ago

ACCount37 10mo ago

eSIM is specifically designed to deny user freedom. They are impossible to transfer from device to device by design, for one. Every single "transfer" has to be approved and signed off by a cellular provider in an online mode. They can deny it at will, or just neglect implementing it, and you can do nothing at all. It's pretty clear that when GSMA talks of "security", they mean "security of the business models". What does that mean for the users? It means they're getting fucked.

bcye 10mo ago
What would be the use case for that?
- ACCount37 10mo ago
  What would be the use case of being able to transfer a SIM card from one device to another at will, you mean? What kind of question is that.
  - ashray 10mo ago
    I'll post an example for the parent just in case they are honestly confused about use cases. Here is one that happened to me. I had an eSIM on my iPhone. My iPhone broke (screen became somewhat unusable, and the phone was stuck in a restarting loop). It was an older model phone so I checked the repair cost and thought I'd rather buy a new one. Bought a new phone. Now, to transfer my eSIM from the old phone to the new phone, I needed the carrier to approve. But I was away from my home country and on roaming. So I tried to call them. They needed me to use a verification PIN they would send via SMS on the old phone, to verify the transfer to the new one. Impossible since the old phone is unusable. Back in the day, I'd have just taken out the sim from the old phone and moved it to the new one. Easy peasy. The only other option in this case now was to visit one of their stores thousands of miles away. Eventually just ended up doing that when I returned weeks later but during this time I could not access several services due to lack of access to my number plus 2 factor codes being sent there. Moving a sim from phone to phone was seamless. Now the carrier needs to approve this swap. Even with two working phones sometimes it's a hassle and there will be delays while carriers decide to approve the move. There is a new feature that allows you to transfer eSIMs easily between phones but carriers seem to be holding onto their power in this regard and not every carrier will let their sims move so easily. This possibly requires regulators to step in and solve the issue - make it up to the user to move eSIMs. I would count on the EU to make this easier at some point. On the plus side, eSIMs are nice to be able to signup and provision them through an app. Helps with travel and roaming. So there's that too.
    - coderatlarge 10mo ago
      this carrier approval to move esim problem is more generalized on modern “smartphones”. unless you opt in to cloud providers holding your data there is no easy way afaik to migrate your authenticator apps to another phone. and a host of other authentication/authorization data is tied to the device in an opaque way. don’t get me started on apple’s unpredictable model of sending 2fa to some other “trusted” device which means tou never know what tou need to bring with you.
      - AlexandrB 10mo ago
        Google authenticator lets you move accounts easily using a QR code + phone camera.
        tscherno 10mo ago
        But no way to backup to cold storage last time I checked. Took a picture of the QR code with another phone and printed it.
        thaumasiotes 10mo ago
        > Took a picture of the QR code with another phone and printed it. Why? Decode the QR code and store the text however you prefer to store text.
        coderatlarge 10mo ago
        i wish there were a straightforward way to export a file of some sort that i can backup without creating yet another special case to manage.
        coderatlarge 10mo ago
        that’s good to know thanks but creates more special cases to manage if i just want to backup my stuff so i can manually recover when i need to (on lost device say).
  - sroussey 10mo ago
    Probably one most people never ask, though should be obvious to those on this forum.
waweic 10mo ago
esim.me, 9esim and "sysmocom eUICC for eSIM" are eSIMs in the SIM card form factor that you can load the SIM profiles onto and use them in any device with a SIM card slot (and of course transfer between devices). In my opinion, that's the best of both worlds.
- ACCount37 10mo ago
  It's good, but they're expensive as fuck for what they are. The best option would be a software-only eSIM with full transfer support, IMO. But we don't have that, because GSMA says we can't have nice things.
  - mbirth 10mo ago
    > It's good, but they're expensive as fuck for what they are. Yep, I remember a time where you could extract the Ki and IMSI from legit SIMs and write that to a bog standard Goldwafer card (which were also used for cable TV hacking) including some SIM emulation software and thereby clone the SIM. That was like 30 years ago and the only thing that changed in SIMs since then is better encryption.
    - ACCount37 10mo ago
      If you had the relevant keys? You wouldn't even need a blank card. You could just make a software emulator and force the smartphone modem to use it. The obvious issue being: it's pretty hard to acquire raw key material. Most vendors refuse to sell it, and the workarounds are messy.

onesociety2022 10mo ago

If what you say is true, why would Apple ever force a switch to eSIM? I’m now less likely to buy a new iPhone because I don’t want to deal with this eSIM fiasco. It’s to their detriment. If their goal is to sell more phones, they would want to eliminate all friction to switch to a new phone. So what you are saying doesn’t add up.

FireBeyond 10mo ago
Less space occupied, more battery, smaller phones. It wasn't the only reason, but was at least one of the stated reasons for the jack removal.
- mbirth 10mo ago
  They also promoted this with the iPhone 17 eSIM-only variant. More space for battery.