[zenexer]

Good point--I tend to forget that. The rather vague article seems to indicate the actual SMS content is being sent to the SIM, though. Why is that?

[opless]

Dumb/feature phones saved SMS messages to the SIM card as simple cards have a limited amount of memory that is dedicated to a crude phonebook and SMS store. Smartphones and smarter feature phones (can) use their own storage for that. You could disable/enable the phonebook/save to SIM features on feature phones and early smartphones.

(I'm talking about win CE and symbian phones being early smartphones here)