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U.S. Carriers and FCC Come to Agreement Over Consumer Unlocking of Mobile Devices

"Early this year, the Library of Congress ruled that it was illegal for certain mobile phone owners to unlock their phones unless specifically authorized by their carrier."

Sounds like lobbying to me. I'd take this new development as a red herring as well. Good thing I don't care whatsoever about unlocking (unless that includes making it work without a SIM card).
 
shenan1982 said:
Not a good analogy.

If you buy a car with a loan, your title will be locked (has a lien holder) until your commitment is fulfilled. You can't fully use the car without restriction until your contract is up and your debt is satisfied.
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It's a fine analogy. The poster said if he buys something with his credit card. A line of credit of that type is unsecured debt. You're comparing this to a car lien which is secured against the value of the vehicle itself. That's an apples to oranges comparison.

If you don't pay back your car loan the repo men come looking for your wheels. If you don't keep up on your phone contract the carrier doesn't have a clause in their contract where they can come take your phone from your hands.
 
Yeah, the "agreement" was:

"Well, the public has finally caught on. We can't f@$k them like this anymore, so let's do what we should have done 6 years ago, then find another pole to bend them over".
 
Good news, but not 100 percent helpful with the iPhone 5s. Unless I'm mistaken the phones for each U.S. major carrier -- the big four -- are different. So I've got an AT&T iPhone 5s, which pretty much means I can use AT&T, Aio -- which AT&T owns -- and anybody else that leases bandwidth from AT&T. Otherwise, I'm probably not going to get LTE coverage.

I just came from Verizon 3G. I don't wanna go back.

Still good news. I just hope phone manufacturers will take this along with the no-contract options from T-Mobile, AT&T and the small players as reason to make unified models. If LTE isn't our standard for a while, it's got a really stupid name.
 
Phrasikleia said:
I recently had a discussion with a man in his seventies who did not understand that his $200 phone was subsidized and couldn't grasp why I would pay much more for the same exact model (to purchase it unlocked).
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I think that has nothing to do with age. Some people just can't grasp these things at all. They can't understand the basic rule, which is that if you enter a 24 month contract, you need to add the initial payment plus 24 monthly payments to find the true cost of the contract, so you can compare different contracts. They only see the initial payment and think that is what they pay.

And I hate the word "subsidised". If something is subsidised, someone is giving you something for free. For example, in the UK electric cars are subsidised - the state actually gives you money for free towards the payment of an electric car. The carriers aren't doing that. They give you a loan which you repay in monthly payments as part of your monthly charges, except that you continue repaying when the loan is paid off!
 
macigo said:
I still will only buy unlocked from Apple. Do not buy from carriers.
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Only when contracts become cheaper on networks that really work around my area.

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firesuite said:
Yeah, the "agreement" was:

"Well, the public has finally caught on. We can't f@$k them like this anymore, so let's do what we should have done 6 years ago, then find another pole to bend them over".
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The public has caught on, but the FCC didn't fight the good fight. We should be stuck with a plan in postpaid, but no locking of said phone is necessary



---------------

Also, lol they said 12 months because they will stop doing the phone subsidy by then and still charge us an arm and a leg.
 
gnasher729 said:
And I hate the word "subsidised". If something is subsidised, someone is giving you something for free. For example, in the UK electric cars are subsidised - the state actually gives you money for free towards the payment of an electric car. The carriers aren't doing that. They give you a loan which you repay in monthly payments as part of your monthly charges, except that you continue repaying when the loan is paid off!
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That's a really good point!
 
gnasher729 said:
And I hate the word "subsidised". If something is subsidised, someone is giving you something for free. For example, in the UK electric cars are subsidised - the state actually gives you money for free towards the payment of an electric car. The carriers aren't doing that. They give you a loan which you repay in monthly payments as part of your monthly charges, except that you continue repaying when the loan is paid off!
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Your comparison is the problem with this world... "the state gives you money for free towards the payment" ... you do realize the "state" isn't a business and taxes come out of your back pocket to feed into your front pocket, right? That's why the US is so screwed up, so many think the government money is free money, when we ARE the government, so it's just reallocation of money.

A cellular phone is the same way. The price of the subsidy is worked into the plan, and you're basically paying for it yourself, just like when you get unemployment you're basically paying into the system then taking from the system.

Subsidy is absolutely the right word for phones, because they're paying down a portion of your outlay. You're paying them back in the form of a higher rate than say a pre-paid service where you bring your own phone.
 
ActionableMango said:
These rules seem in line with what AT&T is already doing.

If you meet the requirements (in good standing, out of contract, etc.), go here:
https://www.att.com/deviceunlock/client/en_US/termsAndCondition

I and many others have used it successfully.
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When unlocked using the above URL does the phone also get updater in Apple's system so if I do a restore on the phone it will not become locked again?

Also, since I have not seen tablets mentioned in this thread. I have a ATT iPad and have no idea if that is also locked to ATT or not. I bought it at the Apple Store and paid full price for it but have never used it on the carriers network.

Is the iPad also locked? And if so, do I need to also unlock it if I move to another carrier (T-Mobile) and wish to use it on their network?

Sorry if I got off topic, but I was not sure where to ask the tablet question.

Thanks,

Jon…
 
Jon-PDX said:
When unlocked using the above URL does the phone also get updater in Apple's system so if I do a restore on the phone it will not become locked again?

Also, since I have not seen tablets mentioned in this thread. I have a ATT iPad and have no idea if that is also locked to ATT or not. I bought it at the Apple Store and paid full price for it but have never used it on the carriers network.

Is the iPad also locked? And if so, do I need to also unlock it if I move to another carrier (T-Mobile) and wish to use it on their network?

Sorry if I got off topic, but I was not sure where to ask the tablet question.

Thanks,

Jon…
Click to expand...

Your AT&T iPad is not locked and will work with other networks. Likewise, once an AT&T phone is unlocked by them, it stays that way.
 
*scratching head*

Can someone explain to me how this "new" policy is that different than what goes on now?

I mean, it doesn't magically make the phones interoperable on different bands. And many carriers unlocked phones for people in good standing anyway.

For example, Verizon always was willing to unlock the GSM side of their dual mode phones, but I don't think this is going to let CDMA users move between Verizon and Sprint.

Is it all just because AT&T has agreed to unlock after your contract is over?

Thanks for any clarification or thoughts!
 
The problem with CDMA being "locked" is due to the difference in how the network is operated. GSM mandates use of a subscriber identity module, aka SIM card. This method attaches your line of service to the card, not the phone, so carrier/country locks are placed in phones themselves; they would reject SIM-cards that are not allowed by certain policies.

On the other hand, CDMA does not have such requirements. Therefore, CDMA phones themselves historically have to be pre-registered to the network before use. Hence, it is not correct that the devices have CDMA portion "locked"; The reason you cannot use unlocked iPhones with CDMA carriers is not because they are locked, but because those carriers refuse to register your device to their network.
 
Jon-PDX said:
When unlocked using the above URL does the phone also get updater in Apple's system so if I do a restore on the phone it will not become locked again?

Also, since I have not seen tablets mentioned in this thread. I have a ATT iPad and have no idea if that is also locked to ATT or not. I bought it at the Apple Store and paid full price for it but have never used it on the carriers network.

Is the iPad also locked? And if so, do I need to also unlock it if I move to another carrier (T-Mobile) and wish to use it on their network?

Sorry if I got off topic, but I was not sure where to ask the tablet question.

Thanks,

Jon…
Click to expand...

Yes you can restore it. The unlock is not temporary.

The reason tablets aren't mentioned is that they are not artificially locked to a carrier. However, some iPad models only work on some carriers because of hardware compatibility. Other iPads work on all carriers. You will have to check your specific model.
 
ActionableMango said:
Yes you can restore it. The unlock is not temporary.

The reason tablets aren't mentioned is that they are not artificially locked to a carrier. However, some iPad models only work on some carriers because of hardware compatibility. Other iPads work on all carriers. You will have to check your specific model.
Click to expand...

Thanks I appreciate it.

Jon…
 
ValerieDurden said:
Quite happy with this pretty consistently. :)

Image
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Jesus Christ!!!! Stop defending Sprint already!!! Damn!!!! If they work for you, fine!!! But for 99.9% of the rest of the country THEY DO NOT!!!

If you want to save money jump on T-Mobile. But stop defending a worthless pathetic company who delivers dial up speeds in 2013.
 
I wonder how this will affect me. I'm on Virgin Mobile which is on the SPRINT CDMA NETWORK in the U.S. T-Mobile is a completely different GSM network.

I guess my question is... CAN THE IPHONE 5s pull this stunt/transition?
I mean is the technology built in, but just locked down?

There are different iPhone model numbers for Sprint, Verizon, & ATT.
I know I checked because currently T-Mobile in the US uses the ATT network.

I'm not looking to switch or anything, just wondering what tech options are available.
 
MattMJB0188 said:
Jesus Christ!!!! Stop defending Sprint already!!! Damn!!!! If they work for you, fine!!! But for 99.9% of the rest of the country THEY DO NOT!!!

If you want to save money jump on T-Mobile. But stop defending a worthless pathetic company who delivers dial up speeds in 2013.
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You have no idea what you're talking about.
 
Chupa Chupa said:
Maybe this is why ATT's Stephenson was so down on subsidized phones the other day. This was long overdue.
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Then their phones should also come unlocked then too. Otherwise the term 'subsidized' should be changed to 'hijacked'...

And how many people actually change providers once their phone is unlocked? I just want to use providers in the UK and France when I travel and save HUGE money over the 'generous' AT&T international plans... Sure, in that case, AT&T loses money, but they would still have 'lost' that money because I would have left my iPhone turned off the duration of the trip...
 
gnasher729 said:
Those who paid their bills. If you owe the carrier money, you are not in good standing. They can keep your phone locked until you pay up.
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That's actually not true. Just because you have already paid your bill does not automatically put you in good standing.
 
oliversl said:
I paid for like 3 iPhone unlock services, 9 US$ each. They work just fine. Having an option to unlock it in the carrier, in a easy way(no login required) would be fine.
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Have you tried it lately? After the library ruling (referred to above), it is just about impossible to unlock an iPhone outside of the carrier. I did it myself for just a few bucks but those are no longer available...
 
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