Topic: New Jersey teen unlocks iPhone

[resopalrabotnick]

the credit for finding this story goes to dgartner. Thanks a lot!

PETER SEVENSSON

Associated Press

August 24, 2007 at 12:21 PM EDT

NEW YORK — A teenager in New Jersey has broken the lock that ties Apple's iPhone to AT&T's wireless network, freeing the most hyped cellphone ever for use on the networks of other carriers, including overseas ones.

George Hotz, 17, confirmed Friday that he had unlocked an iPhone and was using it on T-Mobile's network, the only major U.S. carrier apart from AT&T that is compatible with the iPhone's cellular technology.

While the possibility of switching from AT&T to T-Mobile may not be a major development for U.S. consumers, it opens up the iPhone for use on the networks of overseas carriers.

“That's the big thing,” said Mr. Hotz, in a phone interview from his home in Glen Rock.
The phone, which combines an innovative touch-screen interface with the media-playing abilities of the iPod, is sold only in the U.S.

Calls to AT&T and Apple for comment were not immediately returned.

The hack, which Mr. Hotz posted Thursday to his blog, is complicated and requires skill with both soldering and software. It takes about two hours to perform. Since the details are public, it seems likely that a small industry may spring up to buy U.S. iPhones, unlock them and send them overseas.

“That's exactly, like, what I don't want,” Mr. Hotz said. “I don't want people making money off this.”

He said he wished he could make the instructions simpler, so users could modify the phones themselves.

“But that's the simplest I could make them,” Mr. Hotz said.

The modification leaves the iPhone's many functions, including a built-in camera and the ability to access Wi-Fi networks, intact. The only thing that won't work is the “visual voicemail” feature, which shows voice messages as if they were incoming e-mail.

Mr. Hotz collaborated online with four other people, two of them in Russia, to develop the unlocking process.

“Then there are two guys who, I think, are somewhere U.S.-side,” Mr. Hotz said.

He knows them only by their online handles.

source: www.theglobeandmail.com

[Coknuck]

 

[fr0stbound]

won't he get in trouble with apple and AT&T because of that?

[Blako]

It was on the front page of the newspaper in my "town".
Hackers' handiwork could set iPhone free      Coknuck, notice how the title makes it sound like a good thing

AT&T paid millions to be the sole U.S. provider for the iPhone. It took only two months for a New Jersey teenager, armed with a soldering iron and energy drinks, to undermine AT&T's investment.
His method, which requires a soldering gun, a steady hand and a set of obscure software tools, is one of several techniques Read on...
 

[resopalrabotnick]

there are possible legal repercussions.

first of all the dmca, since he is breaking encryption/reverse engineering protection hack it, secondly apple. apple requires the network providers it partners with (currently only at&t, but more to come in europe) to pay 10% of all revenues created by traffic generated from iphones to them. this is the same as anyone wanting to market a product marked made for ipod having to shell out 10 percent to apple.

[notmybest2day]

I can't remember where the article is, but I remember reading a while back that there was a bill that was passed making it legal to unlock phones by any means necessary, and it is valid for two years from the unlock date.  They make it valid for two years because two years is typically how long the committment is with any given provider.

[Coknuck]

I believe this is the article you were looking for. It was three years not two.

http://www.testmy.net/forum/index.php?topic=17220.0

[tommie gorman]

So it actually is legal then? 

Cool.