Nokia calls Apple nano-sim pledge 'attempt to devalue' competitors' IP - Page 2

Originally Posted by Maestro64

But Nokia is correct apple is trying to devalue what others are doing,

Originally Posted by SolipsismX


This would have to be inputted manually by the customer.

A vSIM is still a SIM.

Originally Posted by JeffDM

In particular, why does Nokia's version of a nano SIM involve IP that Nokia needs to protect?

Originally Posted by JeffDM

Please explain this. How does this SIM standard do that? So far, I've not seen a good explanation from Nokia on this claim. In particular, why does Nokia's version of a nano SIM involve IP that Nokia needs to protect?

Originally Posted by JeffDM

How do you propose a mechanism of making it "just work"? How does the phone and carrier know how to tie to each other without any user intervention? The carrier will have to know how to identify the device and to identify the subscriber. A physical SIM did that for you. It doesn't even line up with your network keys suggestion, because you can't get on a WiFi network without entering the key manually.

The CDMA system was SIM-less but it took a half hour phone call with the carrier to get things switched over to a new account or to switch phones.

Originally Posted by Maestro64

For those who do not understand the value of the SIM, just go to VZ and see what it takes to switch phones when an old one dies or you loose it. Or for people like me who has a number of old phones around the house which I still use for various reason like I would not take my smart phone on a camping trip if I could help it. I move SIM card from one phone to another without a problem. Also as my kids have done they buy their friends old phones and pop their SIM and off they are running does not require any involvement form the phone company what so ever.

Originally Posted by Relic

Well for one thing the Micro Sims is a shipped product. Nokia isn't talking about a new standard of theirs that hasn't been released yet. The Micro Sim now resides in most of their new phones, I have one in my Nokia N9 and Lumia 800. They have every to right complain, if Apple wins this that would mean all existing and future phone designs will have to be scrubbed just to accommodate a sim design that brings absolutely nothing new to the table.

Originally Posted by bullhead

Create/Use an industry standard for the key negotiation, identifying the phone, etc... It really is not a hard technical problem. Maybe you have to enter a credit card number or something to pay. Point is, swapping physical cards is primitive and unneeded. Software could do this easily. Where did i mention WiFi and how does that come up? Interesting though. My iphone, ipad, macs, etc... all work on just about any wifi router without swapping SIM cards. See what industry standards do?

just because a prior SIM-less solution sucked, does not mean everything has to suck. Look at phones before the iPhone.

Originally Posted by Cpsro

In other words, Apple wishes to replace Nokia's SIM technology with a free one?
What a travesty that would be.

Originally Posted by Darkflame808

but seriously who even swaps out their sims nowadays?

Originally Posted by JeffDM

It's nano sim. Micro sim is standardized already.

Otherwise, how is that anyone else's problem? They took a risk for using something new before it was ratified as a standard.

Originally Posted by SolipsismX

I'm under the impression the Micro-SIM was ratified in 2004.

PS: The GSMA was looking to create an embedded SIM back in 2010. It addresses many of the issues I mentioned earlier in this thread plus a few more.

• http://www.prnewswire.com/news-relea...108805624.html

Originally Posted by JeffDM

I'm under the impression this is mainly about the nano SIM though. I don't know what caused the micro SIM to be under discussion.

Originally Posted by SolipsismX

I thought you were talking about the Micro-SIM in this comment:

Micro sim is standardized already. [Apple] took a risk for using something new before it was ratified as a standard.

Originally Posted by Relic

I don't care who wins this just as long they don't take away my right to have multiple sim cards. Isn't the Micro Sim already small enough, how much smaller do these things need to be? Apple seems to be bulking things up not making them smaller so I don't see a need there.

Originally Posted by JeffDM

Relic mentioned it, and I replied to that.

Originally Posted by SolipsismX

That's not accurate. The simple data stored on a physical SIM could be stored as printed text on a card you buy in any store and then inputted manually. This has plenty of benefits over physical SIMs, like being able to store multiple vSIMs at once and switch between them with ease.


Why isn't in legal?

Originally Posted by Cpsro

In other words, Apple wishes to replace Nokia's SIM technology with a free one?
What a travesty that would be.

Originally Posted by Maestro64


But Nokia is correct apple is trying to devalue what others are doing, but they set up the industry and Nokia bit at it, now apple will agree in order for the industry to grow and innovate these essential IP will need to be freely share, Apple will use the Nokia state to show they they are trying to slow down competition

Originally Posted by Misa

First, pointing out the obvious, the Sim card is not a serial number, it's a cryptography microprocessor. Having to enter anything into the phone to activate it on the network will result in easy cloning and is highly error-prone . This is what happened with the ESN system on CDMA/TDMA/AMPS. Programming the ESN phones consisted of a long programming sequence that the average person needed to be hand-held to do. Not the case with the sim card where the customer simply relays the ICCID to the wireless provider to whitelist the sim card.

The Simcard itself is tamper-proof, and can only be emulated, not copied. This is a weakness in the GSM system that allows a MITM attack on slower larger less-complicated sim cards.

Second, when you cancel service, it removes the ICCID from the system, not the IMEI, freeing you to reuse your phone with other carriers without having to change the IMEI, by changing the physical sim card with a different ICCID. If your phone is stolen, you tell the wireless company to destroy the sim card, thus not being liable for any charges after the point of theft, and no data being recoverable. With "find my ipad" type of applications, you probably don't want to do this until you first make an effort to locate it, but if it's not recoverable, remote wipe the phone and then call the wireless company so they can't use the sim card. Stolen phones are used as burn phones by criminals, regardless of them having sim cards or not, however without being able to replace the SIM card, the phones just get garbaged or sent to africa.

The "Sim lock" or subsidy lock is used to prevent subsidized equipment from being bought and resold on the grey market, it's not terribly effective, but it ties the service to the SIM card not the device. So where as CDMA phones that are damaged requires you to buy a new phone, every time. SIM card phones you simply throw away the broken phone and buy any unlocked phone, or even sim-locked phones from the same carrier on the secondary market.

Without a sim card, the phone is tied permanently to the wireless carrier, which puts you at the whims of the carrier's poor business decisions. If the company goes bankrupt, merges or splits, you're saddled with an expensive brick. If the wireless company is hacked and all the devices are sent a "self destruct" message, your device is now unusable.

As for the size of the sim card, the actual chip's die size is about 2mmx2mm, but this is too small to physically handle, and someone could inhale it at that size. Ever try to handle screws for a watch? Apple's design is clearly meant to fit existing equipment with an adapter. The other two designs actually waste space since they just shove the contacts to the end of the card. Altogether I think all the designs don't solve the problem they're trying to solve (making it significantly smaller) and should forget about it.

Apple's design to use the tray takes up less space physically, since to use SD-like contacts requires more mechanical space to be used inside the device.

Look at the N95 that has a sim card and a microSD:


The sim card contacts takes up half the space the microSD card slot does. Given the N95 uses the regular sim card size.

Originally Posted by hmm

It comes down to if this actually fixes something. Nokia seems to be correct in that they're using this for leverage.

Originally Posted by SolipsismX

Sure, but so is Nokia and RiM. The question is which option is better for customers. While Nokia may be tight in that the appearance and size is too close to Micro-SIM that it could cause problems backwards compatibility is the reason that it appears so similar an comes with its own inherent benefits.

Originally Posted by jhende7

Everybody should read solipsism's posts before they post their "I love SIM" comments.

Originally Posted by hmm

I wasn't making a case on what was the better option. I was wondering if this solves any real problems or simply gives Apple extra patent leverage. I get the backward compatibility issue. If they're changing something from the current standard, it should actually solve current problems or problems going forward. When I look at other threads on the topic, much of the responses come down to comments on the aesthetics or size of a design rather than if it solves any engineering problems or makes it easier to swap sim cards when necessary.

Originally Posted by flabber

Apple, Microsoft and Google have been doing innovative things to a lesser or larger degree depending on your point of view (with interfaces, technological ones or otherwise).

Nokia has been doing a lot of that sort of thing about 8 years ago I believe, but they haven't done that in a while. They have been losing a lot in the past few years, just like you mentioned but that's primarily on the phone business itself. As far as new technologisch go (SIM cards in this case) they haven't really done anything worth mentioning I believe. I could be wrong of course, but about 8 years ago all I heard (in Holland) was Nokia Nokia Nokia

Originally Posted by Darkflame808

Apple should just do away with the sim altogether.

Originally Posted by SolipsismX

If there are other considerations here I certainly have read them or thought of them. I guess my final question is why isn't RiM and Nokia's designs even smaller if backwards compatibility isn't a concern?

Originally Posted by SolipsismX

I'm quite familiar. Here, I'll break it down for you.

First of all, we can get rid of the address book and messages storage. It's a pointless feature for the future of smartphones.

(Warning: These next things are really tricky but they do require looking at how the technology works, not at the little piece of plastic)

Second, we have the IMSI. This essentially identifies the carrier and its country. This is up to 15 digits but could be shorter if using a full alpha-numeric. It's not unlike the way the Mac. However, inputting this into the phone could be reduced even more by putting most of the information onto the mobile baseband. This not only adds much needed security now afforded by the easily cloned SIM cards but reduces the amount of data the user would need to input with a vSIM.

Also, things like the OSEN, SMSC, SPN, SDN are all basic information that are coded to the carrier and country so this simple data can be part of the mobile baseband database, thus not needing to reside on a physical card.

Next we have the ICCID. This is the number you find engraved into your SIM card. It's not hidden. It can't be. It's up to 19 digits long. This would have to be inputted manually by the customer. That said, aspects of it like the country code and issuer are redundant to some parts of the IMSI as far as I can tell. Still, it's only 19 digits added once to the mobile baseband's storage and acts as the SIM's social security/tax ID number.

Finally we have the authentication key. This is unfortunately stored on physical SIMs and is passed over when SIMs are cloned. This is major issue that goes unnoticed. Again, this key could be stored on the mobile baseband so that is can authenticate with the network with added security. The vSIM would contain its own passcode that will be authenticated by the carrier against the ICCID and other data.

This system could even be smart enough to know that when you leave one country's network and enter another it would ask you if you wish to switch vSIMs. However, because this is a low-level, very secure system pushing this data to the OS layer would not be wise. The best move is to have the user restart the device in order to choose a new vSIM.

Since we're just now talking about the 4th generation of SIM card which probably wouldn't show up until 2013 what I propose is not a solution that I expect to happen overnight. I figure it's a good decade away but the move for more value and security in our communication devices means the physical SIM card will eventually go away. There will be opposition, but it will be from carriers because of control, not people who say they have to have a physical SIM card the way people say they have to have an ODD in case they need to reinstall an program.



1) Incorporating vSIM doesn't mean the physical SIM would go away immediately. In fact, the only way this would work would be to have a couple generations of both system in place.

2) I'm in favour of the SIM. A vSIM is still a SIM. It offers all the same useful features except it adds more security and convenience.



But Apple wasn't putting their Macs on the floppy drive makers's networks. It's a very different situation.

Originally Posted by Mechanic

There was an article a while back that said that the phone carriers both here in the US and in the EU threatened to sue apple if they did away with the sims. It is there way of controlling the industry. So you could not have a true "World Phone" that would run on any network.

Originally Posted by SolipsismX

So if Apple wins with their backwards compatible design it's bad. So you want Nokia or RiM to win with their incompatible design. Got it! Perfectly reasonable and objective response¡




Yeah, I didn't read far enough back up the thread this morning. Mea culpa.

Originally Posted by JeffDM

You didn't say WiFi, but that's the cardless "multi-carrier" system I'm using as a point of reference, there's nothing else close to that idea yet. You did say "The phone OS can store whatever keys are needed to get on a network." which is true, but the mechanism of moving accounts between phones and phone brands is still of concern. Then there's the matter of making you're you're not using the same line simultaneously on multiple devices, something the SIM system is designed to prevent because that causes network problems. And you have to have a system that works globally on thousands of carriers in hundreds of countries and thousands of device models, and compatible with hundreds of regulatory systems. The idea is simple, actually getting it to work so broadly takes considerable doing.

If you have never entered keys to get on your WiFi, then you're probably not secure. Sure, the computer stores the keys, but you have to have a way of getting it into the system in the first place, which is still a clumsy system.