I know the contracts said you have to keep cell service while paying monthly for the phones and pay off the balance if you left the carrier. With these provisions abided, I dont see how ATT would lose a penny if someone simply got their phone unlocked. Even if they got another carrier and switched sims as long as they abided by paying as stated in the terms of the contract. Does anyone know if the contracts explicitly said “you may not unlock this phone”? Even if it does, since you own the phone and are abiding by the payment terms, I find it difficult to believe a court would hold such a restriction on operation of your own property enforceable. Now, if the contract said you dont own the phone until payment is completed i can see you may not have the right to significantly modify the phone. I would liken this to a car dealer forbidding you to put a better radio in your car until payments are completed vs changing the radio in a leased car.
If this person started doing this in 2012, then he was unlocking subsidized devices as that was the norm at the time.
the upside to all of this is that now the public knows how much their carrier subsidized $299 iPhone really ended up costing them.
Pretty sure AT&T had this problem years ago with their offshore call centers. Reps were being bribed to unlock stolen iPhones. Enormous black market for theses stolen devices. They end up overseas.
One would think they would be monitoring the reps unlocking large numbers of iPhones.
The article says the offender was a Pakistani. Did he reach out to people of the same nationality who were working in the US on green cards?
Maybe AT&T got what they paid for, and maybe it's not actually cheaper to hire a foreign worker rather than a local citizen.
Maybe the local citizen workers would be just as likely to accept a bribe. <shrug>
And maybe the corporation that was willing to take advantage of those people who didn't check to see when their phone was paid off, was taken advantage of by someone who was willing to abuse an insecure system.
Maybe the answer is that all of us should be less willing to take advantage of other people.
Comments
the upside to all of this is that now the public knows how much their carrier subsidized $299 iPhone really ended up costing them.
One would think they would be monitoring the reps unlocking large numbers of iPhones.
Maybe AT&T got what they paid for, and maybe it's not actually cheaper to hire a foreign worker rather than a local citizen.
Maybe the local citizen workers would be just as likely to accept a bribe. <shrug>
And maybe the corporation that was willing to take advantage of those people who didn't check to see when their phone was paid off, was taken advantage of by someone who was willing to abuse an insecure system.
Maybe the answer is that all of us should be less willing to take advantage of other people.