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The SIM swap scam: your number moves to the scammer's phone

The scammer moves your number to their own SIM, with a forged document or help inside the carrier. Your phone loses signal, and SMS codes start going to them.

Also called: SIM swap, line hijack.

How it works

  1. The scammer gathers your data and asks for a SIM swap or a port of your number.
  2. Your phone stops making calls and getting SMS, off Wi-Fi.
  3. With your number, they get the codes and sign in to accounts that use SMS.

Where it usually starts: phone carrier.

Another app
Bipe

How it arrives on Bipe. Simulation with sample people and messages.

How to spot it

  • The phone loses signal out of nowhere.
  • A notice of a SIM swap or port arrives that you did not ask for.
  • Friends get messages from you that you did not send.

What to do

  • Contact your carrier at once, through the official channel.
  • File a complaint with Anatel and a police report.
  • Tell your bank and change the passwords of accounts that use SMS.

How Bipe helps

Each item shows where it stands on iPhone and Android.

No SMS codes

Bipe has no SMS code anyone could ask for. Whoever takes your SIM card does not get your account.

iPhone: In the test app · Android: In development

New phone, same account

Got a new phone or lost yours? There is more than one way back into your account, and none goes through an SMS code.

iPhone: Coming soon · Android: Coming soon

What Bipe does not solve here

Bipe does not use SMS, so a SIM swap changes nothing in your Bipe account. But Bipe does not protect your other accounts.

Bipe only protects the chats that happen in Bipe. If someone in the family still uses another app, a scammer can write to them there.

Who describes this scam

Official pages with the scam's script and what to do.

Other common scams

Scams in Brazil in numbers

Where these numbers come from

Researched on 13 October 2026. We only use numbers that have a source. Surveys by a company or a private association are marked as such.