Swapping SIM cards used to be easy, and then came eSIM
arstechnica.com
Swapping SIM cards used to be easy, and then came eSIM
1–10 of 292 posts
Re: Swapping SIM cards used to be easy, and then came eSIM
#2Title 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 ?
Re: Swapping SIM cards used to be easy, and then came eSIM
#3Title 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 ?
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.
Re: Swapping SIM cards used to be easy, and then came eSIM
#4Title 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 ?
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…
What would be the use case for that?
Re: Swapping SIM cards used to be easy, and then came eSIM
#5I had zero issue upgrading my iPhone from one eSIM device to the next. In fact, I even forgot that I had to do anything, it just did it.
Re: Swapping SIM cards used to be easy, and then came eSIM
#6Earlier quoted context omitted.
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…
What would be the use case for that?
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.
Re: Swapping SIM cards used to be easy, and then came eSIM
#7I recently bought a device through my carrier (secondary device, secondary carrier; luckily not my primary device) to replace my existing one.
Old device was still physical SIM new device only eSIM. I paid for it in a store, but it had to be shipped because they don’t have it in stock, even though it was in stock on their website (including after I left). It arrived late, the day before I was set to travel. The rep said I could just turn it on and follow the prompts and it would auto activated. It didn’t. Luckily it didn’t deactivate the old SIM. At least it didn’t until I called tech support and got their help. They said hang up, restart both devices, and the new one should work. Of course it didn’t work and both devices were now unusable. Had to go into a store and have them sort it out there.
On the flip side, being able to have a primary I never change and a secondary that I swap out for international travel has proven to be extremely valuable to me. So you take the bad with the good.
Re: Swapping SIM cards used to be easy, and then came eSIM
#8My wife and I recently switched from T-Mobile to Noble Mobile and it was painless with an eSim. I didn’t have to try to track down my sim slot key, I didn’t have to go to the cell store or wait for a sim card in the mail, I just followed their onboarding instructions and made the new eSim my default. It took about 5 minutes.
Re: Swapping SIM cards used to be easy, and then came eSIM
#9> We gave up the headphone jack. We gave up the microSD card.
Some people might have given it up. I personally own a Sony Xperia phone, and intend to buy another Xperia next year, which will almost certainly still have both. In fact Sony is the one manufacturer that returned to a headphone jack after having removed it for a while. It might be more expensive than the competition, but this is my voting with my wallet.
Re: Swapping SIM cards used to be easy, and then came eSIM
#10Earlier quoted context omitted.
What would be the use case for that?
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.
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.