Im going to be going on vacation and travel in November, and honestly, this is needed. I’m on the lookout for a secondary phone that i can degoogle real quick, put the neccessary apps that i need and just call it a day. I’m already prepping my family and stating that im not gonna bring my primary phone. I was wondering what do you guys use, if any of yall bring a secondary phone. (FYI: I am in the US and will be traveling internationally)
Always be careful of the frequencies that the phone operates on with regards to what cellular ISPs provide in the host country.
You could easily get a phone that shares no frequencies with any ISP, and be left with an expensive paperweight that is useable only on WiFi.
Wouldnt a VPN work in that case? Even on wifi, you gotta use a VPN or you can even carry one of those portable wifi/hotspot devices. (I was actually thinking of getting one of those to try it out)
You are so wrong it’s incredible.
It’s like me saying, “you have to be careful what fuel you put in your vehicle, otherwise it won’t even start”, and then you start yammering on about the channels on the radio and how you need to set them up in a certain way for the car to work.
Bro, that kind of subject disconnect is epic.
Where is the subject disconnect? You do realize that WiFi is not secure right? Even your home wifi is not secure. Its called ISP tracking, btw.
Because I am not talking about WiFi at all. Wifi isn’t even in the picture. Wifi is 100% irrelevant to my original statement.
I am talking about the frequencies handed out to phone ISPs by each country’s telecommunications agency that determines how cell phones connect to cell phone towers in the first place.
Each country has a different mix of spectrums that they hand out, even if the same company operates on both sides of a shared border. So a phone with ISP X that works just fine in a person’s home country might be totally unable to find any kind of a signal to connect to on the other side of the border. No phone calls, no SMS, no mobile data, nothing.
This is because phones are manufactured to connect to a limited number of known domestic frequencies - so-called “international” phones are extremely expensive for this requirement of having all chips for all possible frequencies - so the phone that can work perfectly fine on one side of the border may be totally unable to connect to the frequencies that ISP X uses on the other side of the border - there is no overlap with the phone’s supplied hardware.
It pays to properly read the original comment.
I did read your comment and i mention the vpn cause i thought you were talking about untrusted celluar signals, not due to being able to just having the ability to connect to them.
Where did I mention anything about them being untrusted?
I was talking about a hardware limitation of phones, not security.
VPN only works once you’re connected to a network (WiFi or cellular). If your phone doesn’t support the frequencies used by the cellular network operators in the country you’re visiting it can’t connect to the phone network.
This used to be a much bigger problem 10 years ago, but depending on where you’re going might still be worth looking into.