MacDailyNews - Where Mac news comes first

In the event that they are denied release, all they have to do is "accidentally" upload a torrent (and say it was a Windows virus that caused the accidental upload) of the software to the Green Demon, or the Bay of Pirates, and voila...the entire world could have it now no matter how hard AT&T;and it's band of lawyers try to stop otherwise.

It's as simple as that. Ofcourse, the monetary gains would be tarnished...but still, the world will know that infamous group who unlocked one of the greatest devices in history. That's all you need as a motive.

As I said before, I think that making things "open source" is far far better than being so rude as to try and sell this kind of software. I say "Good for them; they are getting what they deserve!" They just end up screwing it up for everyone.

I would imagine that AT&T;AND Apple will threaten T-Mobile also for letting anyone use their service with iPhones. Nice hack, but utterly useless waste of time.

Why should Apple care if someone hacks the iPhone so it'll work on any network. More sales for Apple, isn't it? Especially in areas where AT&T;service is spotty, or people simply prefer another type of network.

If it involves a software hack, only a small percentage of home-brew types will do it anyway. I think Apple should stay out of THIS fight...

QUOTE: "In the event that they are denied release, all they have to do is "accidentally" upload a torrent (and say it was a Windows virus that caused the accidental upload) of the software to the Green Demon, or the Bay of Pirates, and voila...the entire world could have it now no matter how hard AT&T;and it's band of lawyers try to stop otherwise.

It's as simple as that. Ofcourse, the monetary gains would be tarnished...but still, the world will know that infamous group who unlocked one of the greatest devices in history. That's all you need as a motive.
______________________________

Yup, and they'll find themselves under a lawsuit from AT&T;*and* Apple legal so fast it'll make their heads spin. No one is going to be fooled by the "it was an accident" excuse.

Yup, as simple as that.

Meanwhile, if Apple doesn't already have it, they are working on and will successfully deploy their own bit of software that will absolutely BRICK anyone's iPhone that has been hacked. I guarantee you, Apple anticipated this and they will not be outsmarted by these whiny loser "everything ought to be open source" shit wits.

I'm not going to be paying $600 for a device and then subject it to all sorts of potentially damaging and counter-productive hacking and other forms of messing around.

For what? Just to replace AT&T;with someone else who is probably offering the same quality of service when everything is balanced out? On top of that, the New Jersey kid lost the visual e-mail feature - one of the strongest reasons to buy the iPhone in the first place.

No, thank you. Champions of "consumer freedom" can fork out their own $600 and go crazy!

Apple and AT&T;have a business relationship that they must, with a capital M, guard zealously. End of story.

I am more annoyed someone would try to sell such software. that is just stupid in alll sorts of ways. a hack that is knowingly bypasses someone else's contract is going to be fought. Software like that should be opened up for all. As it is the only way to dodge legal responsibilities. and even then it is uncertain.

While this is probably not even illegal, and there is therefore no reason for discussion, any consumer who is in favor of locked and limited hardware should go buy some M$ stock

An unlocked iPhone won't work on "ANY" network.

Even unlocked; in the United States; it will only work on TMobile (and AT&T;, of course).

An unlocked iPhone CANNOT work with Verizon or Sprint.

Their networks are not GSM; the iPhone hardware is incompatible with non-GSM networks, even if the iPhone is unlocked. Anyone who thinks otherwise is in for an unpleasant surprise. (Among what would be many others, such as losing Visual Voicemail; having to pay more for TMobile rate plans; and an ensuing list of other iPhone features, that are presumably tied to data services specifically over AT&Ts;network, which would no longer work).

All of the mainstream published news reports seem to be conveniently ignoring this. What reason would there be for unlocking an iPhone for use in the United States?

If you want to learn how the game works watch Apple. They don't preannounce products prematurely (except when loose bureaucratic lips will leak as per iPhone), Apple says we have some great things to share with you, TODAY.

Or maybe this was a set-up anyway.

Europe will be different anyways, their laws, less corporate control of law and politics etc will mitigate some of this legal shit. DCMA = don't come messing about.

Hint to the hackers (not crackers), find someone to front it, someone who has nothing to lose, offer 10% - and be honorable. Let at&t;sue him for all he has = nothing.

Sorry it would be too voluminous to share with you what Apple is at, and most get bored less than half way through.

Land of the fee, home of the knave .... etc.

Cryptic? Hope so, pass through information > knowledge > understanding.

Have a great day

At least AT&T;is picking up the legal costs on this one.

> A substantial delay caused by any legal action would render the unlocking software a less valuable commodity as well as creating unforeseen security issues for the company.

Because Apple will defeat the hack with a software update by that time.

I've been with Verizon - great reception; now with AT&T;for one year - terrible reception, and MANY dropped calls in spite of their ads.

I have decided to not buy an iPhone until America goes the way of Europe and allows you to use whatever phone you want with any service you want (at least I think it works that was in Europe). In other words, unlocked phones. This is one stupid system we have here!

MDN Magic Word: "figures", as in, "It figures... we are getting screwed by cell companies".

@DaveM
Absolutely agree! The only reason for a hack is to be able to brag that you hacked the iPhone.

^^^MikeR said it all right there, no need for more whiny posts^^^


ditto mikeR

why would anyone spend money on this phone just to hack it AND then have Apple brick it in a months time with a nullifying of the workaround

This sounds like a marketing ploy.

Step one:

"We are going to release software that will break your exclusive phone..." *waits for a reaction*

Step two:

"Well we invested substancial amount of money into this project and expected a hundred billlion dollar return within the first year" *waits for the volly to be returned*

Step three:

"Oh yes we will gladly accept your generous offer of 10 million dollars in compensation, the hack is yours. Good day sirs."

*dances a jig*

Apple's setting the Venus FLY trap.


BIG surprise when folks de-HOOk their iPhone and try and re-sync with all the Apple goodies coming down the road can someone say .. video capture?
voice recording?
3g?

Folks that mod or mess around with the Iphone .. don't you think Apple BEFORE the thing was invented even contemplated this scenerio? phone unlocked .. 3rd party app's flowing left then right?
Don't you think they at least PLANNED for that?

Either way .. unlock or toy or mod your iPhone .. I think .. expect major consequences down the line. Apple's not stupid. They made the thing in the first place so .. stupid is as stupid does.
Once the dust has settled they're going to pull off a sync manuever bigger than the iPhone release itself.

imon, I couldn't agree more.

Surely, you knew this was what would happen -- AT&T;defending its turf. Apple had to know that such a crack would occur and I am sure they have responses in mind. All they need to do is regularly break the crack with new software to make going with cracked iPhones a choice involving periodic uselessness for owners of pirate iPhones.

But in the end, perhaps years out, the only solution is to untie the handset from exclusive use by one carrier. The whole mobile phone business model is going to change forever. But for now there will be war.

Apple has been going down this road of exclusive one track stuff, such as iChat etc. for some time, not good!

What happened to the computer "for the rest of us"... now more like for the few of us!

Where I live, I can get TMobile, but not AT&T;. Any hack that works will be real tempting, unless AT&T;moves their a$$es here.

You're missing the point... Their real potential customers are NOT folks who will pay $ to use the iPhone on T-Mobile in the US, (despite the risk of software updates blocking the hack and losing visual voicemail functionality). Who would be crazy enough to do that ?

Most of their customers would be non-US users who want the iPhone so bad they can't wait for it to arrive in Asia, Europe, Canada... very few can afford the AT&T;roaming fees for daily use abroad, so unlocking is the only option !

A friend of mine from Toronto bought the iPhone in Buffalo when it came out. Roaming is incredibly expensive so for now he only uses it for Music, Movies and Wifi. He has another phone (with Rogers) in his other pocket.
When the hack becomes available, he won't think twice. He'll just swap the SIM and get rid of the old phone.

except for US residents experiencing poor AT&T;reception in their area, agreed.

Can someone explain please (I don't know the answer as I don't personally own an iPhone and haven't read the contract):

Unless the contract with AT&T;specifies that AT&T;owns the iPhone, or part of its value, till the end of the contract, then the person buying the iPhone owns it. Right?

If that is the case, an iPhone owner should have the right to do with it what they wish, and that includes unlocking it.

Furthermore, if the person who just bought the iPhone never signed such a contract with AT&T;, then there is no legal case to start with.

Should this company sell unlocking software, it seems to me that it would be doing something perfectly legal. In fact, such software has been around for all other handsets for quite sometime now. However, some contracts specify co-ownership of the handset for the duration of the contract. On the other hand, pay-as-you-go usage does not, and the phone is yours to do what you will.

and say it was a Windows virus that caused the accidental upload

...or just accidentally leave it on a stock, unsecured Windows PC with a broadband connection. For good measure, use the same PC to talk about it online (gotta love those key loggers).

The rest will take care of itself.

The iphone is a nice product. It molds many different devices into one easy to use understandable device. It's not revolutionary, THE IPOD WAS. Apple has made millions of dollars off of illegal downloading. The Itunes store was a way to legitimize their device for the mainstream. Apple does not make any money off of the Itunes store. The iphone is different. It's a portable mac. Apple has much to gain off of this device. But I did not buy one because it is not on the faster networks. We all know apple will come out with a better version with the faster 3G networks. I will wait for version 2.0.

Hacking the device is a waste of time because Apple has excellent coders who will squash this hack in 10 minutes...

BIG surprise when folks de-HOOk their iPhone and try and re-sync with all the Apple goodies coming down the road

Apple wouldn't be evil enough to, say, have the iPhone track whose network it uses, would they?

What if a hacked iPhone just happens to stop working after a while? What if it does that AND sets a little flag that voids your warranty? What if your friendly Apple Store refuses to do any repairs on a hacked phone?

Sorry for the FUD, but with the auto-update "feature", you have to wonder what else is going on behind the scenes.

"I'm not going to be paying $600 for a device and then subject it to all sorts of potentially damaging and counter-productive hacking and other forms of messing around."

And that's fine if you don't want to do that, but why should you care if somebody else wants to?

My bet is this, when you buy the boxed phone from Apple, at that point you have no contract with AT&T;unless you try to activate the phone with them. Under US law you are specifically allowed to modify copyrighted phone software to allow it to work with another network. Further unless the terms of your purchase of the phone from Apple state that you must use it with AT&T;, Apple have no way of enforcing that legally either. Activate it with somebody else, tough luck AT&T;.

"Activate it with somebody else, tough luck AT&T;"

you don't really understand. apple has an agreement with AT
@T. which means that any hack will be taken care of, I know they will because i'm in the know...

good luck. and to actually pay to get a hack is funny, most if not 98 percent of hacks are free.

"you don't really understand. apple has an agreement with AT
@T. which means that any hack will be taken care of, I know they will because i'm in the know..."

And then it will be re-hacked. Just how many battles between hackers and those trying to stop them have you been involved in?

Now, imagine that! DUH! What they were trying to do was illegal so for those with common sense. It's no surprise I'm afraid.

Any battle between Apple and hackers will be won by Apple. Period. End of story.

Apple is far smarter than the hackers, and the problem with hackers is that they think they're smart in the first place. All they really are, are insecure computer geeks with too much time on their hands with too much to prove.

Again, Apple is in control of the iPhone. They are in control. They knew *exactly* how the iPhone would be hacked, and knew it would be something to keep the iPhone in the press. They were right.

I can't believe how many people on this board have little or no knowledge about the legality of this. it is PERFECTLY LEGAL to unlock your cellphone. There is NOTHING any company (AT&T;, Apple, Berkshire&Hattaway;, Pfizer or anyone else) could do to you if you choose to hack your phone. They cannot legally prevent you from unlocking it and CANNOT legally re-lock it against your will by any means. According to the laws in the US (DMCA, among others), AT&T;cannot win any legal battles against users who unlock the phone, or distributors of software designed to crack the phone.

This is rather new (December 06) interpretation of DMCA, but it is definite and legitimate.

It would be very very strange if anyone was legally stopped for unlocking any cellphone, including the iPhone.

@ Predrag -

AT&T;is not going after this company for unlocking their phones - they are stopping them from distributing the hack. My guess is that they do have a legal basis for doing so, since the company has pulled their plans for the big launch in order to "assess "the potential of legal action". You can bet that AT&T;has an intimidating legal team that's more than ready to wolf down little hackers like "uniquephones.com".

Hey Oops, are you god or what?

You sure are certain about a lot of things that you cannot possibly know.

So long as monthly revenues come in from ATT, selling open iPhones is simply not as sweet.

One problem with the DMCA, from what I've heard is that, any individual can unlock a phone on their own accord, as most would do. It's the companies that seek to make a profit from selling an unlocked phone or even the means of making a phone unlocked that are excluded from the DMCA, Engadget's article covers this. So like many things under our government, it's illegal to sell what's legal to give away. An open source hack would probably be the best for legal issues. As of right now. Anybody who truly understands this situation knows why things are the way they are. Apple chose AT&T;because of GSM, "Why sell a product if you can't sell it to the world?" They looked at GSM networks and picked the better network, with the most subscribers, with the greatest range and with the best plans. They instantly found AT&T;. Verizon and Sprint refused because they understood that they would have to really treat the phone as special to have them do everything Apple insisted on doing with it. They saw it as an attack on their company's cellular infrastructure. Imagine if Verizon had to give up their precious ad-loaded VCast, just so the iPhone could have the real internet? Not gonna happen. If people simply ask why things are they way they are, life gets a lot simpler.

That was an enjoyable read. Thsnks

This whole - the software should have been free anyway really pi**es me off. These guys worked hard to produce this software. As a software engineer myself, I know the hard graft creating something like this is. So, why shouldn't they get paid for it? How do they buy food otherwise? Software does not just come out of thin air - software is NOT free. It always costs something to produce.

so it okay for them to make money off of someone else work? Apple and AT&T;have invested great resources to produce this great phone more than the average phone. For them to let it be use other than it was suppose to be. For those who are pissed off because you can't use iphone on Tmobile or europe? You knew the detail about the phone before buying it, you should be mad at yourself. As software project engineer, development of new product is not cheap. The risk that AT&T;and Apple took with the iphone should be paid especial AT&T;. You invest into a project with a great risk with great return and someone want to take great return away from you, that pretty low to me.

These hackers are trash to me because if you going to hack something, do for the better good which mean hacks that let you run other application on it or improve the features not down grade the phone where all other features aren't avialable.

T-mobile isn't a good as AT&T;. For those who say, I go to europe or asia i need a phone.... then use your OLD phone! I'm sure when iphone come to europe... you will be able to use your iphone there with another sim card from another iphone provider.

Most of these posts are so oblivious. Do you people realize you are legally allowed to unlock your phone in the US. There are laws on the books that protect you. Apple will not "brick" people's phones with software updates as some people think. The people unlocking will be a minority and I am guessing Apple could really care less.

Apple's interest is that it gets paid each month for each iPhone subscriber. Apple also doesn't want people mucking around with the iPhone and causing problems, which could become black eye stories on the web and could lessen the user's experience with the iPhone (no visual voicemail or other features).

AT&T;'s interest is that they don't want people using iPhones on other carrier's networks b/c then AT&T;doesn't get any money (duh!).

Apple and AT&T;BOTH have a HUGE interest in preventing the hack.

@Oops: "Any battle between Apple and hackers will be won by Apple. Period. End of story."

Wait, what battle? Apple doesn't (or shouldn't) care what people do with their iPhones. it's AT&T;who in in prime position to get pissy. And they don't own the world's cellular networks, so they'll just have to deal with it and pound sand. What, are they gonna get all legal when Apple releases the iPhone to other markets, such as Canada and Europe, where the don't have the same stronghold? Besides, the relationship between Apple and the hackers here is mutually beneficial for both groups, because (a) the hackers get their bit of fame, notoriety, and hopefully some well-deserved $$$ for having performed a service to the public, and (b) at the same time, Apple basks in the critical mass levels of iPhone hype, while new customers buy the hardware to try out the hack. People in those non-US markets won't have to wait to get their hands on one, they can use them in their local networks as soon as this hack goes public. Apple wins because their marketshare instantly increases, and more people around the globe get to show off the tech, thus getting new customers interested. WIN-WIN-WIN for the hackers, for Apple, and in the end, all of US.

iphone is not subsidized by either Apple or ATT. People pay retail for it, therefore they are within their rights to do as they please with it.Following the reasoning of some, what would next be, not allowing one to use OS of their choice because they happen to buy a mac from apple???

To each it's own, period