Live data from Hacker News

FCC wants to kill burner phones by forcing telecoms to get all customers' IDs

404media.co

31–40 of 417 posts

Re: FCC wants to kill burner phones by forcing telecoms to get all customers' IDs

#31

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

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

Re: FCC wants to kill burner phones by forcing telecoms to get all customers' IDs

#33
Here's the link to submit a comment to the FCC:

https://www.fcc.gov/ecfs/filings/express

Ran a quick search and found a whole bunch of news articles, but nobody includes info that makes it easy to route your comment. Feels like the beginning of Hitchhiker's Guide:

> It was on display in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying Beware of the Leopard.

Re: FCC wants to kill burner phones by forcing telecoms to get all customers' IDs

#34
post #21

They’ll get around to guns eventually …

They're already trying to regulate the shape of guns to effectively outlaw everything but the bullet.

Hopefully they tax th bejeesus out of bullets too. Who was the comedian “imma gona pop a cap in yo ass, but first imma set up a layaway”

Re: FCC wants to kill burner phones by forcing telecoms to get all customers' IDs

#35
post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean. It’s the same, you just have to show your passport and fill a form. It takes 1minute to get it done, you can do it on your way to the taxi if you want. Though e-sim are more practical now

I wonder what exactly are they hoping to achieve then? Anything that can be filled out in 1 minute in a taxi can be spoofed with an extra 30 seconds on the dark net buying dark IDs. So this does less than zero for crime, actually encourages more of it, while doing what exactly? It's madness.

Who says anything about crime? the goal is just so they can associate phone numbers with id cards in some fashion right?

If they want to know what tourists are posting about their country that's good enough.

Re: FCC wants to kill burner phones by forcing telecoms to get all customers' IDs

#36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wasn't taking blatant fraud into account. I'm sure that's possible everywhere. I'd bet you can buy cigarettes without the tax stamps in the same shop too. Last I traveled the shop required a passport or uploading one to get an eSIM ahead of time.

Sure, but if you’re a tourist in e.g. Barcelona trying to get a prepaid SIM, odds are the shopkeeper will not ask you for your ID despite being required to. > Last I traveled the shop required a passport or uploading one to get an eSIM ahead of time. Sounds like you went to a carrier boutique and not one of the million independent shops.

Not a good example. In Spain they notoriously demand id/passport and make photo or copy of it, they do it "for the police".

Re: FCC wants to kill burner phones by forcing telecoms to get all customers' IDs

#38

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

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!

Re: FCC wants to kill burner phones by forcing telecoms to get all customers' IDs

#39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but if you’re a tourist in e.g. Barcelona trying to get a prepaid SIM, odds are the shopkeeper will not ask you for your ID despite being required to. > Last I traveled the shop required a passport or uploading one to get an eSIM ahead of time. Sounds like you went to a carrier boutique and not one of the million independent shops.

Not a good example. In Spain they notoriously demand id/passport and make photo or copy of it, they do it "for the police".

That’s the legal requirement yes, I’ve never seen a shop insist on it. Most of them have autofill scripts for the KYC forms.

Re: FCC wants to kill burner phones by forcing telecoms to get all customers' IDs

#40
Had to buy one of these SMS activation services from a guy in Nigeria using a memecoin because claude decided to ban my account because they didn’t like my credit card brand and Claude requires sms activation for new accounts.

Guess these guys are going to make more money in the near future.

Post reply on HN