5 ms·

Isn’t this already a requirement? Can you really buy a burner phone/sim without providing identifying information?

dgellow 4mo ago
In the US you can buy a SIM card and activate without providing any information at the airport. At least in NYC. I was really surprised the first time
- kgwxd 4mo ago
  Why were you surprised?
  - ImJamal 4mo ago
    Not who you were responding to, but most of the western world requires IDs already. The US is an outlier on this issue.
    - kayo_20211030 4mo ago
      I don't think that's true. At least not in the European countries I visit.
      - dgellow 4mo ago
        It’s a EU wide requirement
        kayo_20211030 4mo ago
        I dunno. I can go to Tesco in Ireland and the UK (fine, UK is not EU no more, but still Europe) and get a sim without ID.
        hnav 4mo ago
        Nordics, Baltics and a couple of other countries are the places this still works. The rest of Europe is locked down.
        dgellow 4mo ago
        You’re right, I was mistaken. A proposal circulated to have an EU wide ID requirement but it went nowhere. So it depends the country
  - dgellow 4mo ago
    Because I’m from Europe, and we need to provide an ID to get a SIM card
hstaab 4mo ago
T-Mobile prepaid accounts for example
- olyjohn 4mo ago
  You can just walk in there with cash and walk out with a fully activated SIM without them asking for ID?
  - dgellow 4mo ago
    Correct
    - sgt 4mo ago
      Yes, I recall doing that. I'm a foreigner but I was in the US on vacation. Went to T-Mobile, so easy to get a SIM card.
tracedddd 4mo ago
not at all, it’s easy to buy cash only tracphone, mint, boost, etc. and there are plenty of explicit anonymous providers such as phreeli. That said, I don’t think its a problem whatsoever and we shouldn’t have laws restricting it.
- downrightmike 4mo ago
  the only solution is to upgrade the phone system to require ID, but that would cost billions to AT&T, so that ain't gonna happen
kotaKat 4mo ago
Back in the late 2000s-early 2010s you could grab some Verizon bubble pack flip phones and just dial an activation string on the handset itself and it'd set up a new phone number for you and you'd just have to go add airtime with a prepaid card or credit card without having to provide anything. Some of the LTE tablets even powered up and put you into a walled garden with data (heh, DNS tunneling worked out of it) to let you sign up for a mobile plan out of the box. When I did some activations with PagePlus with an actual dealer-level account, it cost me nothing to activate a 'customer' handset and the only info I had to provide on the activation screens was the phone's serial number and the requested ZIP/area code for activation. And fine, okay, the FCC will force American telecoms to require IDs, but nothing's stoping Redtea Mobile's foreign eSIMs from roaming into the US for data connections. You're just one eSIM global roaming provider away from bypassing all of it!
- hnav 4mo ago
  They'll just add regulation that requires KYC for roaming agreements.
  - trumpdong 4mo ago
    So basically people from Africa won't be allowed to use their phones in the USA by order of the government? (If they can even get into the country without ending up in an ICE camp, of course)
    - Tangurena2 4mo ago
      That will be a feature and not considered a bug.
Zigurd 4mo ago
I used to buy test phones for software testing at a bodega where they had a laundry basket full of phones, and they would sell prepaid SIMs no questions asked.
autoexec 4mo ago
I had reason to pick up a couple cheap pre-paid phones at a gas station once. I wasn't asked to give an ID to anyone to buy them, but once I had them I needed to call a company to activate the phone and they were very particular about what phone number it would work from. It had to be a landline. Payphone wouldn't work. My work phone didn't work. It was difficult to track down a phone line they'd accept and even then one of the phones refused to register. It seemed to me like they wanted to make sure they could tie the phones to an individual through activation.

In the US you can buy a SIM card and activate without providing any information at the airport. At least in NYC. I was really surprised the first time

kgwxd 4mo ago
Why were you surprised?
- ImJamal 4mo ago
  Not who you were responding to, but most of the western world requires IDs already. The US is an outlier on this issue.
  - kayo_20211030 4mo ago
    I don't think that's true. At least not in the European countries I visit.
    - dgellow 4mo ago
      It’s a EU wide requirement
      - kayo_20211030 4mo ago
        I dunno. I can go to Tesco in Ireland and the UK (fine, UK is not EU no more, but still Europe) and get a sim without ID.
        hnav 4mo ago
        Nordics, Baltics and a couple of other countries are the places this still works. The rest of Europe is locked down.
        dgellow 4mo ago
        You’re right, I was mistaken. A proposal circulated to have an EU wide ID requirement but it went nowhere. So it depends the country
- dgellow 4mo ago
  Because I’m from Europe, and we need to provide an ID to get a SIM card

hstaab 4mo ago

T-Mobile prepaid accounts for example

olyjohn 4mo ago
You can just walk in there with cash and walk out with a fully activated SIM without them asking for ID?
- dgellow 4mo ago
  Correct
  - sgt 4mo ago
    Yes, I recall doing that. I'm a foreigner but I was in the US on vacation. Went to T-Mobile, so easy to get a SIM card.

tracedddd 4mo ago

not at all, it’s easy to buy cash only tracphone, mint, boost, etc. and there are plenty of explicit anonymous providers such as phreeli. That said, I don’t think its a problem whatsoever and we shouldn’t have laws restricting it.

downrightmike 4mo ago
the only solution is to upgrade the phone system to require ID, but that would cost billions to AT&T, so that ain't gonna happen

kotaKat 4mo ago

Back in the late 2000s-early 2010s you could grab some Verizon bubble pack flip phones and just dial an activation string on the handset itself and it'd set up a new phone number for you and you'd just have to go add airtime with a prepaid card or credit card without having to provide anything. Some of the LTE tablets even powered up and put you into a walled garden with data (heh, DNS tunneling worked out of it) to let you sign up for a mobile plan out of the box. When I did some activations with PagePlus with an actual dealer-level account, it cost me nothing to activate a 'customer' handset and the only info I had to provide on the activation screens was the phone's serial number and the requested ZIP/area code for activation. And fine, okay, the FCC will force American telecoms to require IDs, but nothing's stoping Redtea Mobile's foreign eSIMs from roaming into the US for data connections. You're just one eSIM global roaming provider away from bypassing all of it!

hnav 4mo ago
They'll just add regulation that requires KYC for roaming agreements.
- trumpdong 4mo ago
  So basically people from Africa won't be allowed to use their phones in the USA by order of the government? (If they can even get into the country without ending up in an ICE camp, of course)
  - Tangurena2 4mo ago
    That will be a feature and not considered a bug.

Zigurd 4mo ago

I used to buy test phones for software testing at a bodega where they had a laundry basket full of phones, and they would sell prepaid SIMs no questions asked.

autoexec 4mo ago

I had reason to pick up a couple cheap pre-paid phones at a gas station once. I wasn't asked to give an ID to anyone to buy them, but once I had them I needed to call a company to activate the phone and they were very particular about what phone number it would work from. It had to be a landline. Payphone wouldn't work. My work phone didn't work. It was difficult to track down a phone line they'd accept and even then one of the phones refused to register. It seemed to me like they wanted to make sure they could tie the phones to an individual through activation.