SIM is the second factor when it comes to proving that this device with this physical SIM is indeed accessing the network.

Fraudulent SIM swaps are attacking a different layer of the system, they are social-engineering underpaid idiots to associate a new SIM with a given account & number.

You could in theory social-engineer a bank to reissue someone's payment card and somehow intercept it in the post or steal it from their mailbox. That doesn't mean chip & PIN is insecure.

And from my understanding, these social engineering and sim swap problems are mostly ( if not all ) US specific. I have never heard anything near the order of magnitude of US sim swap from any other country. Most countries have Personal ID that are required and issued by government as verification. But even places like UK will require address and Driving License / Passport proof along with security questions.

> But even places like UK will require address and Driving License / Passport proof along with security questions.

I was a phone store monkey in the UK a few years back and a dedicated attacker can absolutely bypass this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29714400

I can only assume it's not more common because other scams are more profitable and/or not enough targets (banks, etc) use SMS 2FA as their only method of authentication so a SIM swap wouldn't give you much.

But Esim already exists. Nobody needs to steal your SIM card to start using your phone number.