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Apple in 'Advanced Talks' With Mobile Telecom Groups for Standardized 'e-SIM' Cards
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With all do respect... You don't even know how it would work yet. What if all the carrier has to do is press a button or you change a simple setting?
I would think the carriers would be on board with this too since they could drastically reduce the amount of SIM cards they would need to have manufactured, thus saving them money. That said, what about carriers who choose not to support this? So far, as far as U.S. carriers go, I've seen no mention of Verizon, Sprint, or any of the regional carriers being involved in these discussions.
It's pretty crappy that Apple locks iOS. What a terrible company. Right?
So after all that trouble to get carriers to support GSM so it could be easier to change carriers by just swaping SIMs, we're just gonna revert back to the way CDMA worked. Lovely.
Just my perspective as a long term Verizon user.
Just my perspective as a long term Verizon user.
You wouldn't. You'd go to your carrier's website (or phone them), log in, and ask to switch phone. There'd then be some sort of challenge-response process to securely 'pair' the phone with the account using it's unique built-in ID (plus, maybe, a PIN you were given with the phone). If you had an old phone on the same account, Its up to the carrier whether this deactivates your old phone or if it simply prevents two phones connecting to the same account.
Carriers could operate a "guest" account which let unregistered phones connect to the registration server so you wouldn't need a separate computer to do this (and wouldn't need to copy challenge/response codes between phone and computer). Phone stores and SIM vending machines could probably use NFC.
Advantages:
+ you've just registered your phone without sending SIM cards by snail mail.
+ no faffing about with mini/micro/picoSIM adapters and trimmers
+ A phone could store multiple 'parings' and quickly switch networks (e.g. for travel).
+ Should take less time than changing a SIM
Disadvantages:
- Easy to implement from scratch, not so easy to implement as kludge to existing SIM system
- Should be possible to create a secure protocol, I mean, no large organisation ever screws up security, right?
- If you do get a security breach, it sounds like new phone time rather than new SIM time.
- If someone hacks your carrier account they could easily register a phone to it. However, if someone hacks your carrier account they can cause all manner of trouble anyway. Carriers might want to improve their authentication.
No fundamental reason why they should. If implemented properly, signing up to a new carrier should be purely between your phone and the new carrier. SIMs don't stop network locking: the practice is commonplace, its only legislation that forces carriers to allow unlocking. I doubt SIMs would stop networks only allowing 'approved' models of phones if they put their mind to it.
Of course, there's a danger that the system will get corrupted by vested interests simply because change is an opportunity for corruption, but technically it mostly makes sense.
Physical SIMs made sense at the time because there was no ubiquitous data network to allow electronic pairing.
This seems less like avoiding being locked into a carrier and more like being locked into a phone.
Was there a class-action lawsuit over att locking the apple sim? If not there should be. 'b/c that's how we've chosen to do it' is such an arrogant answer from them.
I have to say I completely agree with gpat. In the UK there are good deals you can pick up for Data-Only SIMs that come with bundled data.
My work pays for a 4G SIM on EE for my iPad, which I pick up for £15 for 6GB which expires after 90 days. For £60/year I get four SIMs which give me 80mbit/sec broadband that I can use for everything expect heavy video streaming. If I'm not travelling I don't pop the next SIM card in and don't pay for a service I don't need.
When I go on holiday I switch to a personal 3G SIM on Three which is £3-£7 for 1Gb which lasts 30 days. This has the benefit of free roaming in 30 countries world wide. Use up on holiday, chuck when I return.
Three big problems with scrapping SIM cards:
- I have active SIMs on both networks at the same time. If it's linked to my device it's unlikely I can do this easily - especially if I'm abroad!
- Once the bundled data is used up the price shoots wayyyy up - e.g. on Three it's £10 for each additional 1Gb.
- These SIMs are sold at retail so there's competition/eBay/... to find them. Shopping around I've found the 1Gb SIM card for £2 once.
Agreed now we can go to the convenience and easy carrier switching that CDMA has had for years...
It's funny to read this. Sounds like a complaint about the internet from 20 years ago "But when I downloaded the file, how long can I keep it? I have to give it back somehow, right?". It's all just data, the SIM card does nothing but providing a few bytes of data (literally) to the smartphone in the most inconvenient, bulky and backwards way possible. It could easily be replaced by mere software, there's literally nothing a SIM card can do that can't be replaced by software.
This is actually exciting if it works to our advantage.
Grab any phone, enter your phone number, account info, etc. Your previous phone asks you to accept and answer a few quick security questions. Boom. Your sim just transferred.
I hate physical sims. I'm always scared when traveling that I will lose it.
Another cool thing would be after a reboot you need to re-auth your sim. Sure it might be annoying, but you do it already with Touch ID after reboot.
Grab any phone, enter your phone number, account info, etc. Your previous phone asks you to accept and answer a few quick security questions. Boom. Your sim just transferred.
I hate physical sims. I'm always scared when traveling that I will lose it.
Another cool thing would be after a reboot you need to re-auth your sim. Sure it might be annoying, but you do it already with Touch ID after reboot.
I always noticed Verizon is never an industry leader in anything unless its 100% to their advantage. Props to AT&T.
If I'm traveling somewhere where apple doesn't have deals with all the carriers, or possibly any how am I supposed to use the phone? With a physical sim I can easily change it to any carrier but with this I'm stuck with the apple approved options that may not be the best deal or may not exist to begin with.
Verizon has been doing essentially this for years with CDMA, it's only in the last few years that they have started using SIMs because they were needed for the LTE network.
It's supposed to be a new standard, not some new Apple-only-thing. The fact that SIM cards are physical objects has nothing to do with their universality. It's the fact that carriers all over the world agreed on using those things. Hopefully this will happen here as well. I hope it will.
Nobody supports rSAP anymore... it'd be a major step backwards. Instead, we get Apple CarPlay and Android Auto that allows the phone to do everything, rather than be stuck with what the auto manufacturer decided we want to use.
In theory there was nothing stopping CDMA carriers from doing things just like this new standard was, but how it worked out was that it was pretty much impossible to move your phone between carriers. The same thing will happen here if this goes ahead, the carriers will use it to lock down phones much more than they otherwise could.
And as recently as last year, Verizon was still refusing to activate an LTE/GSM phone where the MEID wasn't in their database of blessed devices. Not because they couldn't, just because they wouldn't.
I think the brief hassle of a swappable SIM card makes it easier to have carrier portability.
Call me skeptical, but I'd be shocked if the Verizons and AT&Ts of the world wouldn't try to SIM lock phones with eSIMs.
...which was rectified by people simply placing their physical SIM card in the device instead and wouldn't be possible in an e-SIM scenario...
(I think that's where you were going with it?)
This is exactly how it works right now (in Europe), with a physical SIM.
Obviously I don't know what it's like in the US or elsewhere in the world, but I've never had to deal with SIM adapters or contracts. I buy my phone wherever I want and I use my SIM however I want.
Two weeks ago I bought a new phone, which uses a different SIM than my previous one and the store gave me a correct SIM on the spot, this is how it works in most places around here. When I was on vacation in Bulgaria, I popped in a local prepaid SIM from a street shop. When I returned back home, I just removed the Bulgarian SIM and put my own SIM back in. Done.
I've switched carriers many times throughout my life and it's never been difficult. I just go to the carrier I want to switch to, they give me a new SIM, transfer my phone number from the other carrier, and even cancel my other plan on my behalf. I literally have to do nothing else but replace the SIM and I'm on a new carrier.
Sounds like the US is only catching up to the luxury I've enjoyed all my life. I live in Finland.
I don't think having an e-SIM would make it significantly harder to switch devices. It'd probably end up working like with old CDMA phones where you had to switch the active IMEI of the device on the carrier's website.
In fact, the chief complaint the carriers have with the proposed new system is that they would no longer have as much of an ability to lock customers in to contracts and devices. (I'm sure they will find a way, though).
Something needs to be done about the SIM, though, because until that system changes we'll never get a cellular capable Apple watch. It'll be pretty awesome when we can just switch our cellular service between our iPhone, Apple Watch, and iPad depending on what device we want to use and such. I'm assuming that this is where Apple is eventually going to take this, because who the heck would want to separate cellular plans for each of their devices?
In fact, the chief complaint the carriers have with the proposed new system is that they would no longer have as much of an ability to lock customers in to contracts and devices. (I'm sure they will find a way, though).
Something needs to be done about the SIM, though, because until that system changes we'll never get a cellular capable Apple watch. It'll be pretty awesome when we can just switch our cellular service between our iPhone, Apple Watch, and iPad depending on what device we want to use and such. I'm assuming that this is where Apple is eventually going to take this, because who the heck would want to separate cellular plans for each of their devices?
Exactly... I switched to Verizon from AT&T and don't regret it, but Verizon has the best network and unfortunately they know it. So they charge top of the line prices for it. Until someone has a comparable network and coverage Verizon can continue to sit back and refuse to play ball, while also refusing to offer any initiatives like the consumer-friendly "UnCarrier" ones from TMobile.
Since they know they have the best network and they know it, and they know consumers know it, they don't really have any reason to make things easier/cheaper for the consumer.