Phone has mysterious Virgin SIM toolkit app - Where Did it Come From?

billynibbles · ‎22-08-2022

My phone is a brand-new Redmi Note 11 Pro Plus 5G which I've had for about a month. Its twin SIM slots have only ever had the main EE sim and a Giffgaff SIM inserted.

For some strange reason it has recently sprouted an app labelled 'Virgin' which turns out to be a SIM toolkit which when opened displays "SIM Toolkit not ready or unsupported". Even more annoying is that it appears to be a system app and cannot be uninstalled. Any ideas how it got there? I have never been a Virgin Mobile customer. More to the point, how can I get rid of it? When I check the App Info, it doesn't potentially seem to do anything that can't be done in the phone's main SIM i.e. to turn data restriction on/off

Chris_B · ‎22-08-2022

@billynibbles You’ve not said where you’ve got this device from because EE didn’t sell this device so you need to take this up with where you got the device from.

To contact EE Customer Services dial 150 From your EE mobile or 0800 956 6000 from any other phone.

Christopher_G · ‎22-08-2022

Hi @billynibbles

Welcome to the community.

Where did you get the device from? Have you tried restoring the device to factory settings? If you're giving it a try, please make sure you back up all of your information first.

Chris

billynibbles · ‎23-08-2022

It was bought from the official Xiaomi UK website. Curiously, if I remove the EE SIM, leaving only the Giffgaff SIM iit reverts to being called SIM toolkit (still doesn't work though) . When I add in the EE SIM, it takes on the name Virgin (didn't they used to piggyback off EE?) . To be honest, I just want rid of it but it appears to be unremovable as a system app. I'll persevere with a Xiaomi forum.

Christopher_G · ‎23-08-2022

Let us know what information you get and whether you get it removed, @billynibbles.

It could help someone else in the same situation on future.

Chris

Lizzy2222 · ‎14-05-2025

I've just noticed this on my Xiaomi phone too - it's over 5 years old but I've only noticed this virgin app recently - pretty sure it's a recent addition. It isn't using much memory, but I'd still like to get rid of it if it's not of any use. Did you find out how to do this?