This I agree with. If you are paying FULL PRICE, the phone will be unlocked at the time of purchase. Period. If it's not, why should anyone have to pay full price?
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Would it be possible to get AT&T to Unlock my iPhone 3G?
- Thread starter MrMacMini
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This I agree with. If you are paying FULL PRICE, the phone will be unlocked at the time of purchase. Period. If it's not, why should anyone have to pay full price?
And after the contract, what makes it any different than what you say below? You should be unable to unlock it
Yes, you're right. After subsidized phone's contract runs its course, they should unlock the phone.
I've had very limited experiences with AT&T, but I had a Blackberry out of contract, which they unlocked for me to use overseas.
However, it appears the iPhone is an exception, which I'm not sure is legal after contract expiration.
The fact of the matter is, in the United States today, there is no regulation at all that specifically deals with the ability of a cell phone to inter-operate with other carriers. The only things the regulators care about are:
1) Will the phone continue to operate even in the presence of outside interference beyond its licensed frequency range? (Regulated by the FCC)
2) Will the phone's operation generate any harmful interference beyond the frequency range in which it's licensed to operate? (Regulated by the FCC)
3) Does the phone, when used as recommended, adequately perform the tasks advertised at the time of sale? (Regulated by contract law)
The phone's ability to work with carriers other than AT&T is not one of the advertised capabilities of the iPhone in the United States. So AT&T doesn't have any duty to provide that capability -- no matter whether it was bought under contract with a subsidy, or it was bought outright without a subsidy.
It's possible that lawsuits such as the one in California might lead to the creation of new requirements regarding unlocking -- but for the time being, no cellular carrier in the United States has any duty to go out of their way to facilitate unlocking of any phone if they don't want to do so.
On the other hand, as has been pointed out, it is generally accepted that the current law in the United States permits cellphone owners to go behind the carriers' backs and use software hacking to unlock their phones without the carriers' consent. But neither the carrier nor the manufacturer needs to facilitate it, and manufacturers are also permitted to go out of their way to make it as difficult as possible, if they want to.
Certain portions of spectrum held by various carriers were licensed by the government with a requirement that carriers must not discriminate on the type of equipment that they allow to use the spectrum, provided the equipment is technologically capable of using their service. But that doesn't actually have anything to do with facilitating the unlocking process itself; rather, it deals with how carriers deal with customers after the device has already been unlocked.
Anyway, long before that requirement came into place, all the major GSM carriers in the USA already had a longstanding policy of permitting any customer to "bring their own" technologically compatible equipment, so it didn't really change their practises at all. If anything, the new spectrum licensing conditions were probably aimed more at bringing the major CDMA carriers in line.
1) Will the phone continue to operate even in the presence of outside interference beyond its licensed frequency range? (Regulated by the FCC)
2) Will the phone's operation generate any harmful interference beyond the frequency range in which it's licensed to operate? (Regulated by the FCC)
3) Does the phone, when used as recommended, adequately perform the tasks advertised at the time of sale? (Regulated by contract law)
The phone's ability to work with carriers other than AT&T is not one of the advertised capabilities of the iPhone in the United States. So AT&T doesn't have any duty to provide that capability -- no matter whether it was bought under contract with a subsidy, or it was bought outright without a subsidy.
It's possible that lawsuits such as the one in California might lead to the creation of new requirements regarding unlocking -- but for the time being, no cellular carrier in the United States has any duty to go out of their way to facilitate unlocking of any phone if they don't want to do so.
On the other hand, as has been pointed out, it is generally accepted that the current law in the United States permits cellphone owners to go behind the carriers' backs and use software hacking to unlock their phones without the carriers' consent. But neither the carrier nor the manufacturer needs to facilitate it, and manufacturers are also permitted to go out of their way to make it as difficult as possible, if they want to.
Certain portions of spectrum held by various carriers were licensed by the government with a requirement that carriers must not discriminate on the type of equipment that they allow to use the spectrum, provided the equipment is technologically capable of using their service. But that doesn't actually have anything to do with facilitating the unlocking process itself; rather, it deals with how carriers deal with customers after the device has already been unlocked.
Anyway, long before that requirement came into place, all the major GSM carriers in the USA already had a longstanding policy of permitting any customer to "bring their own" technologically compatible equipment, so it didn't really change their practises at all. If anything, the new spectrum licensing conditions were probably aimed more at bringing the major CDMA carriers in line.
Have fun with that. Lets unlock all the iPhones because here in the USA - we have 1 choice. AT&T. T-Mobile doesn't count because you can't even use the phone to it's full potential. Lol.
Uh, people do travel beyond the US. People would also like to sell their unwanted phone to people in other countries. Bottom line an unlocked iPhone is more valuable than a locked one.
APPLE and ATT is bigger than government
i want to unlock my iPhone legally also - because i completed two year contract and and it is freaking my phone; i can do whatever I want with it...
APPLE and ATT are really waiting for some government action before doing any steps to unlock the old iPhones ...
think about all these iPhones sitting as iPods because it cannot be unlocked properly (without going illegal method).
Telecommmunications Act. Unlocking phones is legal.
Exactly. It's not Apple, it's AT&T. Funny thing is, even AT&T spread the FUD that Apple was the one locking iPhones.
For those wondering about the legality, FCC already said that provider-locking is fine and wireless carriers have no obligation nor compelled to unlock their phones, so there you go, shows you how the telcom companies are in bed with the politicians.
Unlocking phones is legal, but providing an unlocking device or service is still considered illegal per the DMCA.
But doing it yourself is not illegal. You could argue that people hosting websites telling you how to do it for yourself may well be breaking the law by disseminating the information (presuming the USA has jurisdiction wherever that website is hosted).
However, if would not be illegal, per the current DMCA exemption, for you to avail yourself of that knowledge to unlock the phone on your own. Of course, you'd be losing access to warranty protection.