Apple says iPhone unlocking may cause permanent damage - Page 2

As I posted above the AP report indicated that this is the SIM unlocking ONLY, not the jailbreak, although it may make sense to restore before update to keep things cleaner.

If this implements the Touch restore mode then jailbreak looks to be a lot harder based on the reports I've read. Might be a while.

Some people keep saying that. It's just not viable though. Apple will keep coming out with bug fixes (you do want those, right?), security updates (ditto), and more features, software, etc.


Ah!!! Apple did say that there was someone who didn't care about that! Congrats for coming out of the closet!

I don't understand why anyone would install any 3rd party software or unlock their phone until Leopard comes out. The phone, as it is right now, is a wonderful piece of hardware and software. However, many of the features both present (calendar, notes) and unreleased (iChat, wireless bluetooth sync, iPhoto forwarding) are going to be heavily updated when Leopard appears. Who knows, there could be an entire firmware and software rewrite that adds and extends features to a whole new level. Apple stated that it is not going to realize the total profits of the phone until 2 years after sale so it can add and upgrade features over the life of the product.

When Leopard is released both the iPhone and AppleTV will be given new features that will only be realized when updated with Leopard installed technology both on themselves and in conjunction with a Leopard equipped Macintosh.

Wait it out another month or so, it will be worth it in the bigger picture of the Apple's long run plans.

That's quite the motivation. This isn't breaking your contract with your dad to mow the lawn. This is breaking a multi million (possibly billion over 5 years) dollar contract. That means consequences to pay if you don't hold your end of the deal. Exclusive means exclusive. It's not just gonna work out like

Apple : Hey remember that exclusive contract for all that dough
AT&T : yeah...
Apple : Well... we tried our best but people wanna use it outside your network
AT&T : oh....
Apple : yeah so I guess the peope have spoken our hands are tied.
AT&T : oh... alright, well it seemed like it was a good idea maybe next time.

yeah, i agree, the wider selection of software and themes is much better than the default, but I would say for this first major update its safer to make sure your phone is back to default and then let the hackers catch up.

Three words: Bring it, Steve!

If the new firmware totally fubars the phone... unlockers won't load the new firmware.

Hell, Steve himself has said that true DRM is not possible... why should locking be any different?

This is all just bluster so they appear to be doing their due diligence for their end of the contract with AT&T.

Err.... because most countries have an equivilant to the FCC which requires all communication devices to be approved ? Notice how fast the iTouch is getting released in all 22 ITMS countries ? The lack of a cell receiver helps.

I think the iTouch/iPhone comparison is more complex than that. There is still the WiFi that needs to clear regulatory hurdles. I think it's that Apple is trying to find carriers to pay them money, and there are carrier-side changes needed to support some of the iPhone features.

Two questions:

1- When will we see class action lawsuits from iPhone owners who do not accept that Apple is denying their right of ownership over the iPhones they paid so dearly?

2- When will U.S. antitrust authorities open an investigation on the abuse of monopoly from Apple in denying the right to choose a cell phone service to iPhone owners?


iPhones are bought, not rented, and owners can choose any cell phone service provider they want.

By the way, willfull destruction of property, or willfull damage to iPhones by Apple, is an actionable wrong that can be prosecuted, especially with iPhone owners class action lawsuits for damages.

There is no reason why any company should support people who use their products in an unintended manner.'

Why should Apple try to make updates to it's software around people who are breaking the iPhones software in the first place to get around certain restrictions?

You all are being ridiculous. If you want to unlock/hack your iPod that's fine, but don't expect Apple to condone it.

the apple secret service is pulling all the stops! no service, phone blacklisted, maybe you will even be excommunicated for messing with your own phone. obviously att is coming down VERY HARD on apple, but hey, thats what you get for making deals with the devil. if steve would have been a little less greedy and just let all service providers sell the iphone he probably would have made more money with less headache.

so to all those who are now sim lock free, dont panik. nobody is bending you arm, forcing you to install the next iphone update, which will likely only feature the (needless) itunres download functionality.

I predict that an upcoming iTunes update will require a certain firmware to be present on the iPhone, in order to sync the library, and those who choose to stick with 1.0.2 will also have to stick with their current 8 Gigs of music.

The Blackberry has an available international roaming plan whereby all data is free for an extra $10-20 per month. Not sure about the Treo.

BTW, just turning off mail didn't seem to work, and the bigger gripe on data was that when connected to a WiFi access point it would opt for Edge instead of the WiFi link.

I wouldn't say these are "GOOD" reasons. As for the visual voicemail, who really gives a ****. People would MUCH rather have an Unlocked worldwide-capable phone. This is really a bunch of bull**** that Jobs locked out frequent travelers from swapping SIM cards.
And all for more $$$ from the cell companies. You guys are starting to ACT LIKE MICROSOFT!!

STEVE: THE WORLD IS GETTING SMALLER. HOW DID YOUR IPHONE WORK WHEN YOU WERE AT THE LAUNCH EVENTS IN THE UK, FRANCE, AND GERMANY? How were those extraordinary roaming charges? or didn't you have to pay? Well either way no one of use gets free phone service nor are we rich to pay the outlandish roaming charges.

I think the SIM lockdown was the worst product strategy decision Apple has made in YEARS!

Therefore the DMCA, the most likely piece of legislation that would make it illegal does not. Therefore it is legal. Somewhat indirect, but still valid.

i agree 100%, but dont count on the 'authorities' to do anything. i dont know if you have noticed, but over the last 10-15 years our elected officials (both democrats and republicans) have put the public interest and the good of the nation as a whole behind the interests of their respective party, their own power and glory and whichever lobby is greasing their palms the most. the congress approval rating which is around an all time low proves my point...

The carriers do indeed cripple phone's features (only in AMERICAN where the government is too busy get a b***job by the telecom lobby than to actually protect consumers). BUT ONLY ON PHONES THEY THEMSELVES SELL IN THEIR STORES. You ever seen an "unlocked" phone sold at retail that was crippled? Are you crazy? Apple could have easily sold this unlocked without a SIM and there would be NOTHING THE CARRIERS COULD DO TO KEEP IT OFF THEIR NETWORK. NOTHING! A GSM radio is a GSM radio. The only thing missing would be visual voicemail, but I bet ALOT of people would rather have an unlocked phone than that.

So don't be so condescending towards others when your arguments don't hold water...

I would love to see it happen and destroy the whole concept in the cell phone industry of locking people to service providers. This is already done in some countries in Europe. Others have strict cellphone unlocking laws. All this done in the name of consumer protection. Thats REAL consumer protection, not recalling faulty laundry detergent. Consumer protection FROM companies ILLEGAL business practices, not products themselves.

Imagine if computer vendors "locked" you to a certain Internet service provider. Just imagine if Apple locked their mac hardware to only connect to a special router that could *ONLY* be purchased from and work with the service of your regional cable internet provider?!? Would everyone just go along with it???? because thats exactly what they are doing NOW!

If we had a real government, this bull**** wouldn't happen. These types of "you own your product, except for the EULA 'contract' " bullshit has got to go. Its GLARINGLY obvious to anyone that has taken an extensive look through the data that its legally questionable AT BEST.

Keep tossing the greedy ****, bought and paid for republicans in '08. We almost have enough of a democratic majority in the house and senate to get REAL things done. Just a small percentage more of seats. so close.

yeah its called don't upgrade itunes. just like with the Fairplay cracker.... no different. always going to need to be watchful though. btw, not talking about myself I dont even have an iphone or use iTunes anymore.

New stratagy for hackers: partner with green peace


Apple should, upon hack detection, set all firmware to a pre-modification state...make it like new, not brick it and doom it to an early and unnecessary trip to the landfill...

I dont like greenpeace, but I hate cell industry screw jobs even more.

Are you mad? If the company i work for sees a customer using our product in a way we havn't thought of, mentioned, or designed the product for, we dont take it away, we add it to the list of things that the next rev of that unit should be able to do out of the box!

It is as simple as this, people love the iphone for its interface, which is the best in the world, bar none, but third party apps are what make it usefull!

Apple is in a really odd spot, they are emencly popular for their last 6 or so years of rapid innovation, but they are becoming so controlling of all of their platforms that they are hurting the userbase, how much longer will the honeymoon last?

I am reminded of a great song from 38 Special, hold on loosly, but dont let go, if you hold too tightly, you're gonna lose control!

personally i hope it does brick every single unlocked phone.

apple hasn't left out any country. everyone is just too damn impatient to wait until they knock out a deal. after all the disputes with cisco with the IPHONE it slowed the process down, but from a source: canada and japan are in the works right now, and there's known use of iphones being tested in australia.

you complain that it's not right that the phone isn't unlocked isn't the issue. i know there's some phones on O2 that i had my eye on but never bitched that i couldn't get it because it was locked into the O2 network. if everyone was complaining about that one phone and how they wanted it so bad, i'm sure O2 users would say "well too damn bad". whatever. i got over it. get over it.

eveyone complains about the iPhone, yet they want it. i see no logic in this. oh well.

Thanks. I'm going to ask some folks I know with the Blackberry. Its just that everyone I know with one is a corporate, non-paying sub and they obviously don't care.

I have used smart phones for years; I have owned a HP iPaq, a Treo, several Nokia's, a Samsung Blackjack, ALL of them I was able to unlock for travels overseas or when I switched service providers. All I had to do was ask the provider for the unlock code and I received it in an email in a few days. I did not have to ask the phone makers for anything to do this so why should I not be able to do the same thing with the iPhone ???...If I buy one and pay FULL PRICE for it like I would if I went to any other Phone Maker (who by the way will sell a phone unlocked) then why Should I agree to let them tell me whom I can and can't use it with, I understand that their may be a chance that not ALL the functions will work due to the service provider not having that function on their network but all the basic functions will work once I place a SIM into the phone (Like making calls).

I have had AT&T, Cingular, and T-Mobile (all of witch are GSM service providers) I was required to meet some requirements for the companies to unlock the phones, but once I meet the requirements I was able to have my phone unlocked, or if I bought a phone that was unlocked to begin with all I had to do was insert my SIM in the phone.

I had to set up the phones to work with the service providers setting to enable services like MMS, E-Mail, Wap, and Internet, the service providers were more then happy to assist me with the settings (they were able to get me to use services that I paid extra for i.e. data services) to them this meant more money for them as I was using more services, they did not care if I was using a phone from them or from anyone else the more services that I used the more money they were going to get on a monthly fee.

I was able to travel to other locations and use a Prepaid SIM and was able to make calls on the local carrier and avoid international charges (by the way range from 1.99 - 8.99 per min) and data charges that ranging from $0.001 to $0.015 KB or more and that does not even cover SMS or MMS charges that are billed at an international rate.

So if it is so wrong for a person to want to use any phone that they want to OWN on any NETWORK that is available to them, in an area for a price that they agree to pay (prepaid or Post Paid) then why am I and so many other people able to call a service provider and get phones unlocked or buy them from the phone makers that way for use either in the US or Overseas with little or no hassle from the service providers or the phone makers (except for the iPhone that is).

That's ridiculous! Why aren't you calling for lawsuits against all phone manufacturers? They all do that. Every phone company offers some phones that are exclusive to them.


2- When will U.S. antitrust authorities open an investigation on the abuse of monopoly from Apple in denying the right to choose a cell phone service to iPhone owners?[/quote]

Same answer as above.


This is really silly. no one forced anyone to buy what they knew was a locked phone.

You may not like it, but they are good reasons.

If the firmware is fracked from the point of a firmware upgrade, then it's not Apple's fault.

This is no different than Apple telling us to disconnect third party drives, scanners, etc when performing an upgrade, except firmware is much more susceptible to error.

Remenber the Firewire problems during upgrades?

All this talk about "Bricking" an iPhone sounds far fetched to me. There's no way to "irreparably damage" an iPhone without physically breaking something. I doubt Apple has a hidden self destruct chip in the thing.

If it was bricked, which I doubt will happen, I'm sure someone will be able to crack into it again. Maybe I'm wrong, but I don't see how a software or firmware update can do any irreparable damage to the thing, it's all FUD.

You're talking about something entirely different. People aren't finding new uses for the same product, they are essentially changing/breaking the product to create a different product that suits there needs. It would be life if you took a broom, chopped of the sweeping part, and used it as a hiking stick. Can you honestly expect that your new hiking stick would be covered under warranty for the broom? But software is so much more complex than that example.

And how many products like cleaning products, etc does it say on the bottle, "It is illegal for you to use this product in any way other than intended/directed."

By purchasing and using the iPhone (or any product), you are automatically agreeing to the terms and conditions set by the manufacturer. If you don't agree to the terms and conditions, you must choose not to use the product, or you are legally at fault.

i got so into this discussion and have been following it all day and then i realized something:

we are arguing about or rights and how the goverment should get involved and how this is against the constitution blah blah blah...

and this is all over

A CELLPHONE!

(i have one and have hacked it and just got to touch as well so im "on the bandwagon of apple fanatics" as well)

when it comes down to world issues, this is so unimportant.

I love how we can make such a big deal over such a small thing. I guess that shows our love for Apple.

(think about how many people would have the iphone if it was open to everyone! it would be outragious how many people would get it.)

didn't they once say masturbation causes blindness

Maybe because 95% of the world's population lives outside the United States???

Poor Golf.

I call bs to some of these comments saying Apple is completely justified bricking the unlocked iphones.

I would bet the farm there are either Apple and/or AT&T employees posting to this story. I once worked at an ad agency that had a mac-related company as a client and our boss forced us all to post 'damage control' on a regular basis. I quit shortly after this took place.

For the record, I own 4 macs, and 3 ipods. I have previously owned an additonal 4 macs and 2 ipods. I have helped / persuade no less than 5 friends of buying an ipod and bought my future mother in law an ibook. I am pretty much a mac zealot...

but I think the locked iphone deal is bum deal. Almost all the arguments I've seen posted here why the iphone 'needed' to be locked I call bs.

visaul voicemail? hardly compelling, sounds only useful to super busy CEOs like Steve who want to dodge a certain amount of voicemail. if you only get 3-5 voicemails a day, do you need visual voicemail?

if i lived in the u.s. i would sign an at&t contract b/c i've heard mostly good things but being in the uk now i don't want O2, i know too much about them... the point is everytime apple chooses an exclusive carrier in a new country they immediately alieanate a certain amount of the country's population.

I can't see how an unlocked gsm phone could be blackballed by the mobile industry? If there is any truth to this argument and someone knows, then spell it out to us.

why in the world should a company be responsible for making sure a hack continues to work when they update their software?


are you people retarded?


i fully endorse hacking, modifying, working ways around manufacturer limitations, but i in no way expect (or like some of you people demand) full support from the manufacturer. when i screw with it, everything from that point on is ONLY MY RESPONSIBILITY.

Apple is simply giving fair warning, so you people that unlocked the phone, don't update the iphone anymore and stop complaining that the company isn't spending money to support the hacks.



...i feel like i am taking crazy pills... take responsibility for your actions people!

It would be a monopoly only if Apple were the only source of any sort of cellular telephones in the U.S. In fact, it is quite the opposite - the vast majority of cellular telephones in the U.S. today were not manufactured by Apple.

I don't think the report was that the GSM phone would be blacklisted by the mobile industry.

Rather, I believe the implication was that Apple might choose to record the serial number of any unlocked iPhones it comes in contact with, and subsequently refuse to provide maintenance service for that iPhone for the remainder of its lifetime, regardless of any attempts by the owner to re-lock it.

Perfectly within their rights in the United States currently, I suppose.

There's a difference between "You're breaking the law; you're legally obliged to never use the iPhone with anybody other than AT&T." (patently false), and "You didn't hold up your end of the bargain, so we won't hold up ours." (absolutely reasonable)

I'm still looking forward to seeing Apple's official response in the UK, where it's my understanding that (unless they officially acknowledge that it is "subsidized") the service provider is legally obliged to sell an "official" unlock mechanism to any customer who requests it, at any time.

(If it is subsidized, my understanding is that the legal obligation to furnish an unlock service only comes into force after the initial contract term runs out.)

We're not talking about taking a broom and using it as a walking stick.

We're talking about taking a kitchen broom and using it in the living room.

In either case, you're certainly not suggesting that we're breaking the law by taking that broom out of the kitchen, are you?


Usually those cleaning products have markings like that because they contain hazardous materials, and the government has environmental protection laws prohibiting certain risky uses. It's not the manufacturer placing those restrictions on you; it's the government.

By affixing the label, though, the manufacturer is indemnifying itself against any allegations that it was complicit in your illegal activity.


I disagree with this statement as you've phrased it.

If you rephrase it slightly, I might be inclined to agree:
"By purchasing and using the iPhone (or any product), you are automatically agreeing to the terms and conditions communicated to you by the manufacturer at the time of sale. If you fail to live up to your obligations under those terms and conditions, the manufacturer it no longer required to meet its obligations either. You may also be required to pay certain damages. As well, the manufacturer is not at fault for anything that goes wrong as a consequence of its unintended use."

Depends on what is meant by 'irreparable'. In an absolute sense your probably correct BUT to fix any number of problems you would have to have additional equipment that would have access to the memory without a functioning phone.

For example type 'sudo rm -rf *' at your root directory (you can do this on the phone with the current hack) and then try to recover your system WITHOUT a CD/DVD or external disk Not going to happen. These things don't exists for the iPhone (outside of the development labs) I would NOT expect the Apple Stores to have these type of facilities, nor would I expect them to cover this a warranty issue.

A user induced change could accomplish the same type of no-recovery situation by breaking the communications with iTunes after the upgrade, for example. So Apple's concerns are very real.

At the time of purchase of an iPhone, according to the agreement, it may only be used on AT&T networks. Regardless, Apple has not taken measure to prevent people from using "unlokced" iPhones on other network -- they just stated that they will not condone such actions, and as such, they are not responsable for any incomatibilities users experience due to updates, etc. It's ridiculous for people who unlock the iPhone to expect Apple will support the iPhone.