Apple’s hopes and dreams of creating a Universal SIM that can be used interchangeably on any operator in the world just got a big indirect bump of support from the GSM Association today in Barcelona. Together with some head honcho mobile operators, the GSMA has finalized their standardization requirements for an embedded SIM card that can be remotely activated on any GSM carrier in the world, eliminating the need to swap SIM cards every time you flip-flop between carriers. The report is set to be submitted to the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) for review by the end of February. This embedded SIM will work in conjunction with traditional SIM cards, allowing carriers to easily and securely flash their settings over the air to the phone, eliminating the SIM locks some carriers employ and killing off the need to purchase unlock codes of you want to jump ship to a different carrier. The new embedded SIMs are scheduled to hit production phones by 2012 if all the bureaucratic approval hurdles are overcome without setbacks.
You must be logged in to post a comment.