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Apple said to be preparing for iPhones without SIM card slot in 2022

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Re: Apple said to be preparing for iPhones without SIM card slot in 2022

#201

Post by Nextgrid »

newsbinator wrote: post #191
Nextgrid wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Number assignment is handled at the network level. I have the exact functionality you speak of (single number to multiple devices) on my company's good old physical SIMs. Phones & SIMs don't even know nor care about their own number. The SIM has a field for that but in fact it's often left empty (iOS devices discover their own number by texting a known Apple number and getting the response via the Internet, they'll t…

> iOS devices discover their own number by texting a known Apple number and getting the response via the Internet, they'll then populate this field out of courtesy but it's not necessary for functionality TIL! Is that why in some countries and some SIM cards my iPhone can automatically report its own phone number (when I look at my own profile under 'Contacts') and in some countries it doesn't do that?

Yes!

Carriers who assign numbers to SIMs in advance could set that field directly. Others, either because they don't assign a number at the time of the SIM manufacture/personalization or just because they can't be bothered as it's not functionally necessary will leave it blank - in that case from my experience iPhones will populate the field with the number they get back from the iMessage & FaceTime provisioning step but again that's not actually necessary for functionality. The field is also user-editable in Settings -> Phone if you wish.

Re: Apple said to be preparing for iPhones without SIM card slot in 2022

#202

Post by saurik »

jwr wrote: post #66

I am very worried about this. While I love (and sometimes use) eSIMs, the physical SIM has a huge advantage in that it gives me freedom. It's the revolution that GSM brought: just take your SIM and move it to a different phone. No permission required. Arguably we've become slaves to ecosystems of either Apple or Google at this point, as pretty much nobody uses a phone as "just a phone", you need to have an account wi…

You are sadly already going to have problems with this in the near future anyway :/.

https://www.xda-developers.com/t-mobile-att-require-volte-ph...

> If you have purchased a recent smartphone directly from AT&T or T-Mobile, then you very likely have nothing to worry about here. However, if you’re using an unlocked device or a device on a custom ROM, then you’ll want to pay attention to what’s coming. Since AT&T whitelists devices for VoLTE compatibility, you won’t be able to BYOD to the carrier starting February 2022 unless the carrier changes its practices or whitelists a lot more devices.

Re: Apple said to be preparing for iPhones without SIM card slot in 2022

#203

Post by heavenlyblue »

Nextgrid wrote: post #180
headmelted wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm actually more worried about a different problem - I don't care about removing the physical SIM slot but I'm really concerned about halving the amount of numbers someone can have on a single device. Phone numbers are an utterly terrible system. Having to give a single number out to everyone is a stupid beyond belief design that we just tolerate year after year. That SIM-based 2FA exists makes this even worse. Appl…

Multiple numbers is already technically possible and does not require eSIM. It does require the carrier to innovate and actually do some engineering though, and there's no market pressure for them to do so.

Vodafone UK still associates your contract with a phone number. That is, if you wanted to keep the contract and re-associate your phone number with a new contract that is not possible without paying for the remaining months on the contract.

Re: Apple said to be preparing for iPhones without SIM card slot in 2022

#204

Post by thorawy88 »

zinekeller wrote: post #163
Nextgrid wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Those SIM engineers should build other unhackable systems too! They did - see EMV payment cards for example. > it simply means that it's useless for security. It's not - SIMs close one attack vector where credentials can't be stolen by malware/bruteforced. Current SIM-swap attacks don't scale well; imagine how worse the problem would be if any Android malware could silently take over your number even after you've w…

> They did - see EMV payment cards for example. To drive the point home - this is a SIM card: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/55/Thuraya_... (although you can remove the mini-sim in this revision, originally they were exactly like modern EMV cards). Again, if you're skeptical of the government itself and allowing them to tap your communication lines, then I understand your hesitation here (although 2…

If you are skeptical of government, live off grid.

Sure are a lot of rugged individuals who can do it all (they claim) yet seem to not notice they hardly accomplish any more than anyone else without the help.

I’m skeptical of other humans period. You’re regurgitating the most reinforced rhetoric in your experience. You’re decoupled from the actual work implementing solutions to these problems, and the ease at which theft and fraud occur without technology.

There’s no such thing as a 100% secure system. Physics doesn’t allow it. Accept it. Lean into your biology to self soothe.

I may mistrust the government but like everything else it’s just people, not a black box.

Come on internet geniuses; open source and hardware are right there for you to make this happen. Get funding. Prove you can do better. Show you’re more than syntactic and semantic drivel.

The collective of people making your phone work are incompetent, says the person whose probably never tried. What a joke.

Re: Apple said to be preparing for iPhones without SIM card slot in 2022

#205

Post by Nextgrid »

heavenlyblue wrote: post #203
Nextgrid wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Multiple numbers is already technically possible and does not require eSIM. It does require the carrier to innovate and actually do some engineering though, and there's no market pressure for them to do so.

Vodafone UK still associates your contract with a phone number. That is, if you wanted to keep the contract and re-associate your phone number with a new contract that is not possible without paying for the remaining months on the contract.

Potentially, but my point is that it's a commercial decision or incompetence (maybe the number is used as the primary key for the contract record?) - technically there is no reason for this.

Re: Apple said to be preparing for iPhones without SIM card slot in 2022

#206

Post by patentatt »

threeseed wrote: post #142
keraf wrote: post #57

Hopefully by removing the SIM tray, they have now enough space to put the headphone jack back. (bit of sarcasm but I really miss headphone jacks in mobile phones)

> but I really miss headphone jacks in mobile phones Buy a USB-C/Lightning to 3.5mm dongle and leave it permanently attached. Not ideal I know. But one benefit is that the DAC Apple designed in that dongle is so good that the sound quality far exceeds any phone with a built-in 3.5mm jack.

It's very good indeed, but last I recall it measured slightly worse than the built-in 3.5mm Jack in previous iPhones. But it still likely exceeds transparency especially for the form-factor and use case.

Re: Apple said to be preparing for iPhones without SIM card slot in 2022

#207

Post by Nextgrid »

ksec wrote: post #198
Nextgrid wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

SIM is the second factor when it comes to proving that this device with this physical SIM is indeed accessing the network. Fraudulent SIM swaps are attacking a different layer of the system, they are social-engineering underpaid idiots to associate a new SIM with a given account & number. You could in theory social-engineer a bank to reissue someone's payment card and somehow intercept it in the post or steal it from…

And from my understanding, these social engineering and sim swap problems are mostly ( if not all ) US specific. I have never heard anything near the order of magnitude of US sim swap from any other country. Most countries have Personal ID that are required and issued by government as verification. But even places like UK will require address and Driving License / Passport proof along with security questions.

> But even places like UK will require address and Driving License / Passport proof along with security questions.

I was a phone store monkey in the UK a few years back and a dedicated attacker can absolutely bypass this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29714400

I can only assume it's not more common because other scams are more profitable and/or not enough targets (banks, etc) use SMS 2FA as their only method of authentication so a SIM swap wouldn't give you much.

Re: Apple said to be preparing for iPhones without SIM card slot in 2022

#208

Post by lajamerr »

tablespoon wrote: post #193

I don't like it. Having a physical object the embodies your phone's identity is a lot easier to deal with in many ways than an ethereal emulation of said object. For instance, if I'm traveling I can just buy a SIM card at a kiosk and pop it in, even if I can only communicate through little more than pointing and grunting. Another example: I got a new phone recently, but since all my stuff was still on my old phone, a…

I imagine a world where you just a bring a phone anywhere and it you open your network settings, go to your cellular data menu, and then automatically it detects the mobile network providers that support the towers it can see.

Then you tap on the one you want, select the package you want, pay for it from that menu and then bam you are connected.

All without having an existing Wi-Fi or Cellular data plan.

There needs to be some basic/back-end service that allows for this type of communication to people not already subscribed to a mobile network.

Re: Apple said to be preparing for iPhones without SIM card slot in 2022

#209

Post by maratc »

tablespoon wrote: post #193

I don't like it. Having a physical object the embodies your phone's identity is a lot easier to deal with in many ways than an ethereal emulation of said object. For instance, if I'm traveling I can just buy a SIM card at a kiosk and pop it in, even if I can only communicate through little more than pointing and grunting. Another example: I got a new phone recently, but since all my stuff was still on my old phone, a…

> if I'm traveling I can just buy a SIM card at a kiosk and pop it in

If you're traveling you sometimes need to show your passport and fill out forms in a foreign language (looking at you, Germany). Adding eSIM is a lot easier, and will let you keep your regular phone connected when someone rings you (which is not happening a lot lately) or sends you a code via SMS.

There are many reasons to keep SIM cards but traveling is not one of them.

Re: Apple said to be preparing for iPhones without SIM card slot in 2022

#210

Post by robbiet480 »

vmception wrote: post #192

The current and last several iphones have been dual sim, one physical and one eSim. I'm wondering if they keep an eSIM-only model as having two eSIMs. The dual sim implementation is very weird, like its clear they only imagine that someone is popping in a different SIM for travel, as opposed to just having two numbers they use all the time like I do. Even most of the support is catered to travellers with a temporary…

iPhone 13 supports dual eSIMs.
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