A new one appeared yesterday Bell related to the future iPhone 4S/5 which gives us to understand that Apple could implement a new technology in its phones. We are talking about integrated SIMs that would replace the current micro SIMs in our terminals. I knew from October last year that Apple works together with Gemalto(a company specialized in the development of technologies for SIM cards) to this technology, so it is very possible that until now the company has managed to implement it in the iPhone considering that we are talking about almost a year of work. However, what does this technology mean and what is it used for?
Basically, Apple wants to implement a SIM chip in phones that would eliminate the need to contact our telephone operator to use the phone in that network. The integrated SIM from Apple would contain all the information necessary for a phone to work in a certain telephone network, just like a normal SIM, and with the help of an application from the AppStore or a new service or program we can configure the phone to work on the network. Basically, we will have to enter some identification data of our subscription/card, the phone will recognize them and know which operator to use them with. If we want to use another operator, then we simply change the information in the terminal and connect to another operator's network without any problem.
The new chips would be extremely thin and would have 2 parts: an updateable flash component and a ROM component. The ROM component would include information necessary for the card to function correctly in any network, i.e. all technical information about networks. The flash component will be able to be updated and the information about the operator and the subscriber will be stored in it, information that must be entered manually by the user to be able to use the phone in whatever network he wants.
These integrated SIMs would allow those from Apple to make thinner terminals or to include new components in the terminals considering that the respective SIM chip takes up much less space than a micro SIM. For Apple there is the advantage of simplifying the terminal activation process and of course some user data will be collected at the same time. On the other hand, there is the possibility that the respective chip cannot be unlocked by anyone, so if coded terminals are sold, we will not be able to use them in another network if our operator does not decode it. No one knows yet how these integrated SIMs will work, but I don't think it's good news for those who use decoded terminals.
In conclusion, the integrated SIM will simplify the way we use our iPhones, it will eliminate the need to use a card but it could lead to the disappearance of decoding.
