Is it hard to buy a SIM card in much of the world? I can walk into one or about ten shops within 5km of here and buy one instantly. I think the price is ‘free’ but you pay something like EUR 10 to have credit on it. If you want to be anonymous, you can wear a hood and a mask and pay with cash.
In the US, it's very unusual to buy a SIM card outside of purchasing a phone and phone plan. And while we do have prepaid options, they're much less commonly used than in other countries.
At a quick glance, the cheapest T-Mobile plan is $60/mo, or $45/mo if you're adding a second line to an existing plan.
You can also get a SIM card intended for IoT usage, but this is probably not something your average non-technical person would know how to do. I also expect that most Americans are unfamiliar with buying a SIM card in a way that is not direct from a mobile carrier.
> In the US, it's very unusual to buy a SIM card outside of
In your circles.
There are entire industries which rely on 'burners', wisely or not, for various logistics tasks involved in deriving tax free income from controlled substances.
Buying a SIM card with cash is as easy as wanting to and doing some searching, or just driving around and looking for dollar stores: the phone provider you want is in the same parking lot.
I could drive to walmart (most large stores, really) and buy 20 sims from various prepaid providers. Most people may not do this, but it is certainly a viable option for such a device.
prior to international roaming bundles becoming reasonable my first task when arriving in the US was always to buy a SIM card. Unlike almost anywhere else the US (well SFO at least) did not have the usual line of SIM sellers at the exit from immigration
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A totally anonymous phone card would be a bit tougher. My guess is that the proliferation of iot devices like CPAPs using mobile data plan means that one could be stolen or dumpster-found without someone knowing the chip needs to be deactivated.
> A totally anonymous phone card would be a bit tougher
Depends on where you buy them. The internet is big and you can have stuff delivered anywhere, including somewhere that doesn't have your name or address.
I think a common form of theft is for someone to be defrauded by an order sent to a third party, as if it were a gift and for the package to be picked up from the third party similar to porch pirate activities. I saw a short documentary about this performed at an semi-industrial scale where the pickup was done by a car service person as a side-gig.
The US seems ok but your mileage may vary by domicile:
As of early 2021, 157 governments required some form of proof of identity before a person could purchase a SIM card, but what form of ID and what other information may be required varies.
Because needing to also get a working SIM card is a pretty substantial “oh, you’ll also need…”