iPhone unlocked: AT&T loses iPhone exclusivity, August 24, 2007, 12:00PM EDT Posted Aug 24th 2007 12:00PM by Ryan Block It's high noon, Apple and AT&T -- we really hate to break it to you, but the jig is up. Last night the impossible was made possible: right in front of our very eyes we witnessed a full SIM unlock of our iPhone with a small piece of software. It's all over, guys. The iPhoneSIMfree.com team called us up to prove their claim that they cracked Apple's iPhone SIM lock system, and prove it they did. (No, we don't have a copy of the unlock software, so don't even ask us, ok?) The six-man team has been working non-stop since launch day, and they're officially the first to break Apple's SIM locks on the iPhone with software. It's done. Seriously. They wouldn't tell us when and how they would release it to the public, but you can certainly bet that they'll try to make a buck on their solution (and rightly so). We can hardly believe the iPhone's finally been cracked. No, scratch that -- we just can't believe it took this long. http://tinyurl.com/28pmgd
Hey, I have a T-Mobile contract! Not that it makes any difference to me since I have no intention of spending any money on a phone and I seriously doubt that T-Mobile will be offering iPhones as free upgrades to customers. Ian
You won't hear me complain. As you know I love hacking and white hat cracking. Dig on the security vulnerabilities, break the firewalls, etc. Just don't be an assh*le about it. Do it for the benefit of the product and its users. Whether that is the case here is uncertain, but we'll see. Meanwhile, I seriously doubt that: A) Anyone is going to pay anything for this crack. B) Anyone with the crack is going to be able to use the iPhone with another service. It could be interesting to see how this point plays out, whether the OTHER phone company could be fooled by the faked SIM chip. C) There will be much benefit in using some other phone company over AT&T. I think they all have pretty much figured out how to nickel and dime us all to death via one tricky feature or another. :-Derek -- Fortune Magazine 11-29-05: What's your computer setup today? Frederick Brooks: I happily use a Macintosh. It's not been equalled for ease of use, and I want my computer to be a tool, not a challenge. <http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2005/12/12/8363107/> [Frederick Brooks is the author of 'The Mythical Man Month'. He spearheaded the movement to modernize computer software engineering in 1975.]
unlock codes for other phones get sold all the time for $20-$30. you don't 'fake' a sim chip w/ a unlocked phone. you use a real sim chip from the other service you want to use. <snip>
According to the articles in more reputable press outlets, the unlocking process requires both soldering skills as well as software skills (so, possible to toast your iPhone and certainly voiding the warranty). The owner of the unlocked phone was able to use it on Verizon. The process has been posted to the team leader's blog.
Hmmm. Maybe that was T-Mobile not Verizon. Randomly Accessible Memory as I get older! There's an article on Slashdot, check that.
Depends what you mean by higher-end, they offer some pretty impressive phones as free upgrades to loyal customers - and if you go into one of their shops you can sometimes talk the sales dude into giving you something higer-end than what they initially say you can have (all it takes is mentioning that you might look around for another network that will give you something better). But I agree, even an accomplished blagger is unlikely to end up with anything that is a serious competitor to an iPhone (Apple would probably say that there are no serious competitors). And I think you missed the joke. Of course they won't offer an iPhone as an upgrade (let alone a free one) because: 1) It doesn't *officially* work with T-Mobile 2) It would annoy Apple, with whom they may want a future parnership 3) In the absense of such a partnership Apple won't supply them Ian
There are now both hardware and software hacks announced: http://apple.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=07/08/24/1858252
Is there any indication that he/they have also hacked the web side? Otherwise, I don't really see the big whoop, except from the "I can do it" bragging rights standpoint.
We need a different ng for the iPhone. It's made by Apple, yes, but I think it merits another place to talk about it
That is not true. You can walk into any Apple Store and buy an iPhone without signing a contract, or you can order one from Apple's online store without signing a contract.
And how does the visual voicemail act?[/QUOTE] That is the only thing that doesn't work. But regular voicemail works.
Didn't know, that was one of the reasons I asked. I am not aggressively ignorant, more passively so (g). Someone earlier in the thread suggested that they did not know if the reliance on EDGE for webside functionality was going to mean that the webside wouldn't work.
Once it's unlocked, you can put in any SIM chip from any GSM based provider. The video I saw showing it demonstrated using a T-Mobile SIM chip and then making a call. Apparenly, almost all the standard features work - calls, EDGE-based web surfing, etc. Missing things: visual voicemail (regular voicemail was fine) and YouTube videos.
If you have a WiFi connection, there's no problem; WiFi is not dependent upon AT&T at all. If the other carrier (T Mobile being the only one at present) supports EDGE, there's no problem, and reports are that it does.
Meh. It runs OS X, which makes it more on-topic for CSMA than the iPod, about which this group has hosted interminable discussions over the years.
Meh. It runs OS X, which makes it more on-topic for CSMA than the iPod,[/QUOTE] If rumors are correct, we'll be seeing OS X based iPods in about a week and a half.
