Virtual SIM, the technology feared by carriers that Apple craves

The US telecommunications world is in turmoil, and the accusation (still to be tried) is heavy: some managers would have pressured to bury the virtual SIM, which Apple craves and which would give users more competition and better prices.

On the complaint of Apple and other companies, the US Department of Justice is investigating the pressure exerted by the country’s leading mobile operators against the GSMA, the group that ratifies mobile standards; the hypothesis is that they used their influence to modify virtual SIMs to their advantage (and therefore, to the detriment of users).

On the complaint of Apple and other companies, the US Department of Justice is investigating the pressure exerted by the country’s leading mobile operators against the GSMA, the group that ratifies mobile standards; the hypothesis is that they used their influence to modify virtual SIMs to their advantage (and therefore, to the detriment of users).

SIM and eSIM

The Virtual SIM (or eSIM, SIM Elettronica) differs from the standard one because it is integrated into the circuitry, and stays there for the whole life of the mobile device. The old SIM cards, the ones we currently use, have been designed instead to be paraded and quickly inserted into mobile phones, with the basic idea to take them behind every change of phone. Today, however, they no longer have any reason to exist.

For some time the telephone number is no longer linked to the physical SIM, and can be transported from one SIM to another using a digital procedure; contacts as well now reside on the phone itself, or on the Cloud, and there is nothing from the point of view of the security that a physical SIM can do better than a virtual homologation. Not to mention that a physical SIM requires a whole series of hardware components in devices that make it impractical to use in certain product categories, so Apple Watch Series 3 mounts just one eSIM.

Apple has yearned for this technology for at least one important technical reason. First of all because it would allow you to save space in devices (which translates into thinner phones and tablets); but there is also a reason for convenience and convenience for users.

Instead of the usual manfrina: go to the store, buy a SIM, get the plan activated, buy a recharge and so on, we could change the tariff plan and manager directly via iTunes, in a few seconds, and with electronic payment. A fluid revolution that would allow users to reward managers and better rates, all to the benefit of competitiveness and portfolios.

Apple, however, believes that carriers such as AT & T and Verizon have pushed the GSMA Group to approve eSIM specifications that would favor managers, and artificially limit market choice. AT & T and Verizon, in fact, own the most substantial slices of US mobile users, and therefore they would have been the ones that suffered the most from user bleeding once the eSIM had come to full capacity.

For the time being, investigations are still underway, and none of the charges have yet been tried; but the risk is that the classic Pandora’s box is uncovered, and the implications will be so far-reaching that they will have the power to change the scenarios here too