As someone who knows how to take apart and put back together both computers a day cars, your post is 100% accurate in explaining why people might not want to spend the time to learn something they have no interest in and do rarely.
And how often do they take a car apart and somehow end up with a computer?
Hey, I don’t know anything about cars.
I wanted to ask: what could happen, in theory, if I simply unplugged the SIM/eSIM/radio transmission chip in my car?
In general unplugging anything in a car means that thing stops working, and unplugging parts of the radio makes the radio stop working. Beyond that it would depend on the car maker as whether it would just make some features stop working or a whole system requires it to be there to save data and settings.
Results may vary but you can always plug it back in after testing.
Toyota’s have no negative effects beyond obviously no cellular functions and the microphone ceasing to work.
I recommend figuring out what the opt-out procedure is too. If I ended up with a Toyota, calling in via the SOS button will start the process of disconnecting the system.
Also note that some may have 3G radios, etc. which are already defunct.
Edit: Fixed typo
