Unlocking Of Smartphones Illegal As Of Tomorrow

jmilcher said:
Locked IN REFERENCE meaning, from Carrier A to Carrier B. NOT a software unlock for features.

It has been in ALL the articles I read. I will find the Engadget article where it EXPLICITLY pointed this out, and in dumb terms explained what a carrier unlock was vs rooting/jailbreaking.
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Dude I've been talking about carrier unlocking and not rooting the entire fricking time. Nowhere have I said one iota about rooting or jailbreaking. Read what I write, and not what you want to think I wrote.

The only reference I made to rooting and ROMs was that HTC story, which demonstrates the DMCA takedown approach to things that are viewed as illegal.
 
McFry said:
Also the carrier cant really detect a rooted phone anyway. Any queries they perform on the OS can easily be spoofed. Keep in mind functions like mobile hotspot simply appear as data usage to the carrier. It's not like your hotspot data is tunnelled through a totally different connection than your normal web data when you browse. The technology exists to detect unauthorized hotspot use, but no carriers actually do this yet.
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That's cool ... this doesn't affect me anyway since I use my phone the way I get it from my carrier ... I also don't mind carrier exclusive phones ... which would be the most likely outcome of this rule change since without the ability to legally unlock you could only use that model on their network :cool:
 
Metrocall said:
I was under the impression matteos was asking about enforcing it on the end user. :rolleyes:
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I was, but even if I wasn't the law still can't be enforced. I don't think it could be considered hard to host files through torrents or sites like thepiratebay.

They can't take down a website that discusses illegal activity, look at all the websites that discuss marijuana
 
For those of you concerned about jailbreaking and rooting, it’ll still be legal to jailbreak/root smartphones which really leaves this cut off date affecting customers looking to unlock devices and switch carriers.
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DIRECTLY From T Mobile, but the laws is applicable to all carriers. :rolleyes:

Source
 
Honestly I can see why this makes sense. Look at eBay for bad ESN phones. You have people left and right getting subsidized phones, cancelling the contract and selling the phones. There's literally a whole market based around this.
 
Disposed said:
Honestly I can see why this makes sense. Look at eBay for bad ESN phones. You have people left and right getting subsidized phones, cancelling the contract and selling the phones. There's literally a whole market based around this.
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A bad esn handset can be reflashed, and I see why that is an issue. But you have to have a good ESN from another inactive phone to reflash to.

But yea people buy them all the time and turn around and sell them a week later. $500 phone cost them $50 lol
 
Why does it matter if the phone is subsidized or not? I still have a contract to pay AT&T after I unlock the phone. They're not renting me the phone.
 
dr.stevil said:
while true, it's not like you're off the hook for the contract if you activate said phone on another network. You have to pay either way.


As for this law... I guess it's not a huge deal now that you can buy most phones unlocked (and AT&T will even unlock phones for you). Still pretty shady though.
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This would make sense if it weren't for the fact that phones are horrifically overpriced to begin with.
 
TechLarry said:
This would make sense if it weren't for the fact that phones are horrifically overpriced to begin with.
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Overpriced in what sense and/or what perspective? Carrier subsidizing usually requires most of the 2 year contract period for the carrier to break even on said contract.
 
does this apply to Canada as well?

This whole idea of locked phones is idiotic. If you're on a contract, you pay the fee anyway, so what do they care and if you're not then you should not be limited by your phone to walk away.

makes me angry ;(
 
I'm not sure why one would need an unlock code so quickly after buying the phone. I called Tmobile and asked for mine and they just gave it to without any fuss whatsoever.
 
M'ichal said:
does this apply to Canada as well?

This whole idea of locked phones is idiotic. If you're on a contract, you pay the fee anyway, so what do they care and if you're not then you should not be limited by your phone to walk away.

makes me angry ;(
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Well, there would be at least two benefits for the carriers:

- Phone exclusives ... with the lock-in guaranteed they could go back to the model of negotiating special contracts with the OEMs to make certain phone models only available for their network

- international roaming ... with more people travelling this would prevent you from buying a local SIM card ... you could use their roaming fees or buy a local phone but not just the SIM card to use with your own phone

although potentially inconvenient these are both the choice of the carrier and if one wanted to avoid this they could follow the European model of buying an unlocked phone model and then shopping around for a carrier ... this rule wouldn't affect that at all
 
Misleading article headline. My cell is not part of any contract therefore it is absolutely legal for me to do with it as I wish.
 
That's a bit shit. Being able to unlock a phone is a huge benefit when traveling overseas so that you don't have to buy a second (often cheap and shitty) phone in addition to your smartphone.
 
In other words, the world's most powerful librarian finds that nobody is forcing us to buy locked phones, no matter how awesome the discounted price of a handset when you shackle yourself to a carrier for a few years.
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Conan the Librarian will ensure punishment is swift.

Seriously though, seems it would be difficult to track and enforce this on the end user. So you unlock your phone from AT&T and move to T-Mobile. AT&T is just not going to see your phone on its network any longer, and T-Mobile has little incentive to turn you in because they just gained you as a customer. And, the only thing T-Mobile can tell is that they have an AT&T phone model showing up on their network. They can't say if you have permission from AT&T to unlock the phone and move it to T-Mobile.

This seems like a very silly thing to bother with in the first place. If you buy a phone on contract you still either pay the contract out, or get hit with the big ETF and either should cover the cost of whatever "loss" the subsidizing carrier suffers.
 
1) I buy a smartphone from a carrier (under contract, locked phone).
2) I unlock / root the phone to install a custom ROM.
3) I have no intentions of changing carriers.

Am I gonna meet Bubba in prison?
 
atp1916 said:
1) I buy a smartphone from a carrier (under contract, locked phone).
2) I unlock / root the phone to install a custom ROM.
3) I have no intentions of changing carriers.

Am I gonna meet Bubba in prison?
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Yes, under the felony charge of not reading the article linked to in the OP.
 
That is a bit shit though. But I use a cdma phone, so I'm screwed either way.
 
atp1916 said:
As in, unlock the bootloader.
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You aren't unlocking the bootloader. You are jailbreaking the phone. Unlocking specifically refers to disabling the carrier lock which prevents you from using a Tmobile SIM in an AT&T phone, or AT&T SIM in Tmobile phone, etc.
 
Don't think so. Unlocking bootloader is not the same as unlocking for carrier.

Sometimes both happen at the same time though (like when I rooted/unlocked a Desire).
 
Skripka said:
Overpriced in what sense and/or what perspective? Carrier subsidizing usually requires most of the 2 year contract period for the carrier to break even on said contract.
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For what you actually get for your money.

$600 plus for a device that costs less than $200 to build is highway robbery IMHO.
 
I guess this is a serious question: What is the end result here?

December I renewed my contract with t-mobile and got a GS3, January I cancelled the contract and paid the etf.

Since day 1 I installed a custom rom.

The phone is unlocked and now running Straight Talk.

So the way I see it ST will no longer be able to tout it's bring your own phone campaigns?

The whole bought a phone on contract and then paid etf thing doesn't seem to fit well with this.
 
MrSneis said:
I guess this is a serious question: What is the end result here?

December I renewed my contract with t-mobile and got a GS3, January I cancelled the contract and paid the etf.

Since day 1 I installed a custom rom.

The phone is unlocked and now running Straight Talk.

So the way I see it ST will no longer be able to tout it's bring your own phone campaigns?

The whole bought a phone on contract and then paid etf thing doesn't seem to fit well with this.
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If you paid the ETF, the carrier will usually unlock the phone for another carrier, but it is at their discretion.

With this new law, they probably can just say no, with no issue. It does not effect the fact that your phone is rooted and has a custom rom etc.
 
TechLarry said:
For what you actually get for your money.

$600 plus for a device that costs less than $200 to build is highway robbery IMHO.
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You are just including the material costs though ... you still need to pay for manufacturing sites ... design engineers ... transportation ... marketing ... etc

We don't complain when a computer costs $1000 ... why should we care when some of these phones (which are essentially mobile computers in many functions) get into that range ;)
 
kbrickley said:
You are just including the material costs though ... you still need to pay for manufacturing sites ... design engineers ... transportation ... marketing ... etc

We don't complain when a computer costs $1000 ... why should we care when some of these phones (which are essentially mobile computers in many functions) get into that range ;)
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Is just a matter of time before you'll get a soldered CPU on your mobo (fact) and a list of web sites that you are allowed to browse. Just a matter of time before you won't be able to install on your PC any other apps beside the "approved" ones...
 
Honestly, how many people will actually be prosecuted under this bullshit law? NONE.
 
This is just stupid, who exactly is forcing carriers to subsidize these expensive smartphones? Why do we have to change laws to suit their business models, instead of them adapting to current laws?
 
Scythe5 said:
Honestly, how many people will actually be prosecuted under this bullshit law? NONE.
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one or 2 to make an example of them. remember that girl from MN that was given a huge fine for 7 songs downloaded off the internet.

Finding anyone willing to sell you an unlock for $3-$4 on ebay will be the hard part They'll do it but for way more.
 
I think it's only fair that part of this law should require carriers to offer an unlocked version at a non-subsidized price. Law makers don't seem too interested in protecting the consumer nowadays, big businesses just have too many lobbyists I guess.
 
So.....just buy the fucking phone without a plan....unlock it all you want

I fail to see the problem in this, if its a subsidized phone plan, play by their rules

I can't say, take a lease out on a truck and then modify the shit out of it, that's also against the contracts terms of service.
 
jober1 said:
I think it's only fair that part of this law should require carriers to offer an unlocked version at a non-subsidized price. Law makers don't seem too interested in protecting the consumer nowadays, big businesses just have too many lobbyists I guess.
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Our cell companies in canada do, I dunno whats going wrong in america

I can walk into any MTS/Rogers/Fido cell store in the city here and buy a cell phone without a plan that I can then take to any other carrier and use
 
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