Comment by raverbashing | Hacker News Reader

Comment by raverbashing | Hacker News Reader

Whenever I hear a rant about SIM cards I just mentally think that this person hasn't thought about the problem for 5 seconds longer than needed.

"Oh CDMA proves you don't need a SIM card" - the stupidity HURTS

Given his difficulty in "buying a SIM card" (which I've done in several countries and it was never as difficult as portrayed) I can see why

- SIM cards makes switching telcos EASIER as CDMA phones need the company to issue an UIMID before you can do anything with it (while SIM cards talk to the company and do that - they're tiny computers) - oh and btw newer CDMA modules are moving to SIM cards

- SIM cards are safer, as initial CDMA systems that fell back to AMPS were vulnerable to cloning

"I wouldn’t have to go to a shop to buy SIM card and I wouldn’t have to go back to the same shop to top-up my SIM card."

And that's why a lot of stores sell (or you know, they just give you) SIM cards and an even bigger amount of stores have top-ups available.

And of course the "proposed solution" relies on login/password which is such a bad taste joke I don't even find funny. A SIM card is a hardware crypto auth module, if there's one thing that deserves to be called "stupid technology of the past century" are usernames and passwords.

Sure, phone numbers are old. It's an old standard that has a big backwards compatibility requirement.

Also, don't most pre-pay SIMs have an online top-up service, usually made available automatically if you try to use data without having any credit. As well as that, most ATMs have an option for 'top up mobile' here in the UK, and pretty much every corner shop will sell you a top-up voucher. Or, of course, you just try dialing a number without having any credit, and you're forwarded to the automatic top-up line.

The idea that one has to return to the shop you purchased the SIM from is insane, in fact, there are many places where this is impossible, for example the local pound store sells all manner of SIM cards for GBP 1.00 (identification? nope, but here, have a pound coin...) but don't do top ups.

If you want the future, look at software SIM cards or e-SIMs [0] (like the Apple one[1] in the latest iPad) which can be provisioned remotely.[2][3]

[0] http://www.gsma.com/connectedliving/embedded-sim/ [1] http://www.apple.com/uk/ipad/apple-sim/ [2] http://www.gsma.com/rsp/frequently-asked-questions-gsmas-rem... [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remote_SIM_provisioning

You're correct on all counts

"It was never as difficult as portrayed" - we are talking about UX here. Stating that something is not as difficult is wrong. The UX is bad. When you go to a new country for the first time, you need to search online or ask around how and where to buy sim card. Yes, you can do it in a lot of countries in almost any grocery store. I'm not saying it's easy and it's close to impossible to have something like this implemented world wide. I'm proposing what I think would be ideal solution.

Login/password is the current de-facto standard. Until something better, widely accepted comes along, I don't see why my phone number should be safer than my facebook account or my bank account (it's not username/password, but the security of cards that we use for payment is pretty bad)

The most widely used 2nd factor for authentication is a phone number. When I log into my gmail account from a new PC they send me a text to confirm. Same for my bank account. Same for several other services.

The reason they do this is because my phone is safer than a simple user / password.

> we are talking about UX here. Stating that something is not as difficult is wrong.

As an UX concept, correct. But UX cannot go against technological limitations, physical reality or security

> When you go to a new country for the first time, you need to search online or ask around how and where to buy sim card

Go walk in the city center maybe? Ask around?

Yes, you usually need to do some research if you want the best price, but that goes for most things . Also a lot of electronics stores can give you the different plans as they have sim cards.

Asking around and doing price research is part of being an adult, sellers won't come together to offer you a price and plan comparison in one page.

You're also assuming that people will want to change their mobile operator when they get to a different country (for a short trip they won't need it, some will need to keep their original phone working)

Now, remote SIM provisioning may be a good option for some devices (not all of them have wifi or are a smartphone), but that's much different from having a user/pwd combination

> Login/password is the current de-facto standard.

Until people start having their cell phones cloned, which already happened and that's why they came up with something better

> Until something better, widely accepted comes along

It's called SIM card, and it is widely accepted, since most carriers went for GSM worldwide https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_mobile_phone_sta...

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