[unstatusthequo]

Still seen swaps with Google Fi. Efani is a much better option if you actually want protection. I am a cyber lawyer and that’s our recommendation to any clients who care. I can’t recall if Efani is throttled on AT&T or Verizon as MVNO, but one isn’t. Easy to ask them.

[gruez]

>Efani is a much better option if you actually want protection

Their website says it's $99/month. That seems a bit steep to me considering all they're providing over a regular provider that charges $29/month is that they do a bit more verification when you claim that you lost your sim. It's not even clear whether they protect against a port-out attack, which is probably worth worrying about as well.

[twright0]

Presumably Efani accomplishes that additional protection by maintaining a human support staff they put more resources into training than the average carrier. That's expensive, especially when you consider that it's a relatively niche service (so small user base to amortize that cost over) and presumably only used by people that really care about sim swaps, likely because they are frequently targeted for sim swaps, and thus the training needs to really work. They also have no other lines of business like device sales/financing that could help cover those human operational costs.

That, plus the fact that it's a premium service that is mostly only useful to higher net worth / higher income people, makes it seem reasonable that it would be quite expensive relative to a regular provider.

[gruez]

>Presumably Efani accomplishes that additional protection by maintaining a human support staff they put more resources into training than the average carrier. That's expensive, especially when you consider that it's a relatively niche service (so small user base to amortize that cost over) and presumably only used by people that really care about sim swaps, likely because they are frequently targeted for sim swaps, and thus the training needs to really work.

According to the BLS "Computer User Support Specialists" get paid $30 on average[1]. Whatever training they give to staff to resist sim-swap attacks, I can't imagine they can't be more complicated than the certifications that "Computer User Support Specialists" have to get through, so I think it's reasonable to model their support costs at $30/hr per person. With the premium they're charging over a budget MVNO they can afford two support people per customer. How many fraudulent sim swap attacks could the worst client possibly attract? Is it really that hard to train someone to deny sim swaps until they go through 11 steps of verification like their website says?

[1] https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_nat.htm

>That, plus the fact that it's a premium service that is mostly only useful to higher net worth / higher income people, makes it seem reasonable that it would be quite expensive relative to a regular provider.

I mean yeah that's the more reasonable answer. It's a luxury product and priced accordingly.

[WarOnPrivacy]

> I can’t recall if Efani is throttled on AT&T or Verizon as MVNO

T-Mobile blocks my Google Voice calls. They have to run inside a VPN.