Talk:Germany/@comment-24682153-20160827190718/@comment-24682153-20160827193620

OK. As many users consider the German registration system a bit confusing. Let me point out the basics again: As you know Europe is under the scarce of terrorism. Anonymous SIM cards are under special surveillance as they have been used for terrorist activities in the past.

The European countries react very differently now: Austria, the UK and others don't register SIM cards at all and have no plans to do so. Spain, France, Italy or Switzerland have a "hard" registration system. Poland and Belgium joined them this year. Germany is still in a special situation where you have a "soft" registration system in place. Here, often online registration on any given address (even a fake one) is sufficient as it hasn't been verified in the past.

This verification system is now under scrutiny as it can be easily bypassed, as you can imgagine. It's just a joke. It's now planned to tighten registration here too. But up to now, only two providers are known to verify the given addresses: Fonic and Lidl Connect.

This leaves us in a dilemma: We don't want users to indulge in any illegal behaviour, but it's still common practice that you can give any address online. The government is also in a dilemma: every German citizen is registered at his residency address. This address, you should supply at registration. But this is impossible for visitors or tourists, who still must be able to get a SIM card somehow.

So you did all right. But you've chosen Lidl connect as one of the two providers that verify street addresses now by sending you a letter. Your relatives made the mistake to reply, that you don't live there, but if there was no reaction at all, it would have had the same effect. They block your SIM for a suspicious activity and they'll block your credit. There is no way to get this back, as you formally acted against the law by giving this (fake, but real) address.

It must be expected that more providers will come forward with some verifications in the future, as the online registration scheme is supposed to stay. This means that you are safe, when you use a MVNO only for a month or two (and don't top-up too much). There is no other way to register most MVNOs but online on a German address. To be on the safe side for using a SIM for longer, you should go to an network operator and show your ID card in their store. You'll pay more with them, but they won't block you for sure.

I will revise the sections to make it clearer. For the moment, I don't see a reason to take these operators off the list as many users have been able to register with them anyway in the past. Sorry for your inconvenience.