Cell Phone Unlocking Is Legal -- For Now 135
On Friday President Obama signed into a law a bill allowing mobile devices to be legally unlocked, so that consumers can switch between carriers. The legislation was kicked off by a successful petition on Whitehouse.gov after the Librarian of Congress decided that cell phones no longer needed an exemption from the Digital Millennium Copyright Act's anti-hacking provision. The legislation (PDF) passed both houses of Congress and is now law. Unfortunately, the new bill doesn't guarantee permanent legality. It simply reinstates the exemption, and leaves the DMCA alone. For the next year, cell phone unlocking will certainly be legal, but after that, the Librarian of Congress once again has the ability to void the exemption once every three years.
LOL, "American Freedom"! (Score:1)
LOL, "American Freedom"!
Re:LOL, "American Freedom"! (Score:5, Informative)
This isn't about freedom, it's an example of "For the People".
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If it really were "For the People" they wouldn't need a law to be able to switch carrier in the first place.
Re:LOL, "American Freedom"! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:LOL, "American Freedom"! (Score:5, Insightful)
And that's the biggest fucking mistake any democratic government ever made.
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So you don't like certain people now?
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And I'd happily plunk down a slashdot sub on a bet saying it's cost more as well.
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Do you ever read what you write? Maybe you have a neighbor who can come over, preview your posts, and tell you when you should turn off the computer, lie down in a dark room for a while, and try again later.
You are mixing together so many unrelated ideas to make points that are either wrong or incomprehensible, that I honestly am concerned about your sanity.
Funny (Score:5, Interesting)
Because where I live carriers are obligated by law to unlock any phone not tied to a contract for free, and one tied to a contract for a minimal fee as soon as the contract is up.
The legality of firmware modifications isn't even talked about, this is a consumer protection requirement.
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Yep, it must be terrible to live in a land where Big Government can high-handedly and arbitrarily restrict the Freedoms of large corporations. It's a shame that the serfs living under such repressive regimes don't have skilled and benevolent lobbyists to help them rise up and throw off their shackles.
At least, that's what the corporate news outlets here in the US are leading us to believe.
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You joke, but it strikes me as unfair that some nations legally restrict phones subsidized from a long-term contract. Even though I don't have such a phone, if I want to enter such a contract it's my business, the government should have nothing to do with it.
Re:Funny (Score:5, Insightful)
Once the contract is done with, it should be your phone and not the telco's phone and that is all these laws are demanding. I can still go to most countries in Europe and get a phone on contract, but as soon as the contract is finished they are required to unlock the phone and to me, that seems fair to both sides..
Re:Funny (Score:5, Informative)
Exactly - you can, like in the US, get a free/reduced price phone with an X year contract if you want. All the carriers would be happy to sell you one. :)
There are two differences: one, when the X years end, they MUST unlock your formerly subsidized phone for an insignificant fee (i think i paid 10 euros last time).
Two, you don't have to get a subsidized phone. There are 5 million places that would happily sell you a new, carrier free phone to use with any GSM carrier.
The carriers are also required to unlock phones not attached to a contract for free - i.e. if you pay full price, it has to be unlocked - but no one's crazy enough to buy a full price phone from them, any other store would be cheaper
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You joke, but it strikes me as unfair that some nations legally restrict phones subsidized from a long-term contract. Even though I don't have such a phone, if I want to enter such a contract it's my business, the government should have nothing to do with it.
There is no problem with long term contracts for subsidised phones. You enter a 24 month contract, you get an expensive phone really cheap or for free, and the cost is included in the 24 month contract. Now you can unlock it. That doesn't mean you are out of the contract. You'll still pay for your 24 month contract.
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My provider doesn't do service contrac
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You seem to be living under the illusion that these kinds of laws bother "large corporations". Whatever costs this will create for them, they'll just pass on to their customers. Corporations like regulations that create barriers to entry, the more the better. And Obama keeps supplying them.
This is nothing but political theater by which crony capitalists like Obama appeal to fools like you, while pissing away your taxes and your retirement funds in handouts to their buddies in industry.
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This doesn't create a barrier, if anything it destroys one, not that it matters given how high the barrier for entry in the cell carrier business is.
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I'm really hoping this is a joke. You realize Congress passes the laws that get to Obama's desk?
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I think he was being facetious.
Anyone paying attention enough to know congress is a do nothing would have had to pick up on how legislation works in order for that to mean anything to make it worth repeating.
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I'm really hoping this is a joke. You realize Congress passes the laws that get to Obama's desk?
Less of a joke than one might think.
Too many laws establish a regulatory framework that then writes regulations
with the force of law. The agency established by the law is under the direct
management control of the executive office.
This is not new with Obama but the recalcitrant congress has made this
more and more visible and "necessary". Consider how the EPA has
extended its mandate to include the CO2 that you exhale and incur simply
by eating and making a living and soon will be carbon taxing you... too
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Consider how the EPA has extended its mandate to include the CO2 that you exhale and incur simply by eating and making a living and soon will be carbon taxing you... too. [...] Some historic "solutions" came to light January 27, 1945...
That's cute. But parody is better when it's not so exaggerated. Even the US right wing aren't stupid enough, insane enough, to go around saying that the EPA is going to tax breathing, nor invoke Nazi death camps to condemn US environmental regulations. The premise of the joke has to at least be believable.
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Consider how the EPA has extended its mandate to include the CO2 that you exhale and incur simply by eating and making a living and soon will be carbon taxing you... too. [...] Some historic "solutions" came to light January 27, 1945...
That's cute. But parody is better when it's not so exaggerated. Even the US right wing aren't stupid enough, insane enough, to go around saying that the EPA is going to tax breathing, nor invoke Nazi death camps to condemn US environmental regulations. The premise of the joke has to at least be believable.
Yes a bit of exaggeration yet the relentless move to legislate regulatory agencies that then craft regulations with the power of law is astounding.
The terrible part is that to tear down man bad regulations the entire agency must be dismantled which
does not happen for agencies that mostly do the right things.
The EPA is easy to point fingers at yet they do constantly work to extend their charter and reach.
Of interest was a bunch of EPA mandates involving rainwater runoff in Virginia. The state of Virginia
w
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Thankfully Obama passed this, because our congress is do nothing. Now, off to get my Verizon phone unlocked so I can switch to AT&T!
Hmmm off to get my phone unlocked while I can....
FWIW I unlocked my previous AT&T phones (never give one up) bought some prepaid SIM cards with other carriers
and gave their networks a try. Here in the heart of Silly Valley -- we have the worlds worst cell coverage. Too many phones,
too few towers. My most reliable phone is a 15 year old unlocked Nokia flip phone. One charge lasts a full week -- a
replacement battery costs about $7. I power it down... put it in a zip lock bag in clean pair of soc
Re:Funny (Score:4, Insightful)
It's de facto been the same in the US...you just ask your company for a code and they give it to you for free (even if the phone has previously been under contract). Additionally, you've always been able to buy unlocked phones.
what about the right to unlock for roaming at any (Score:2)
what about the right to unlock for roaming at any time even when still in contract?
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Roaming is something the carrier can allow on your current sim, what you really mean is "what about using another carriers sim at any time, ostensibly for use overseas"...
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Yes but some places like to say no as they make a lot off of that $15-$20 a meg for data roaming.
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You seem to be contradicting yourself. Once a contract is up, the phone is no longer tied to a contract.... so why wouldn't it be free per the first provision?
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He's making the distinction between phones you can purchase which were never part of a contract compared to those that were part of a contract at one time. It's not a contradiction as it's more redundant on itself if you insist on viewing it that way.
For instance, even if you purchase your phone from the carrier, you can purchase it outright without it ever being under a contract. That would be one not tied to a contract. Of course you can also purchase it under a contract in which it is tied to a contract.
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He didn't say the phones off a contract was tied to a contract, he said they can be unlocked once they are off the contract.
In other words, he is suggesting that the law makes a distinction between phones never under a contract (which must be unlocked free) and phones that have been under a contract (that a small fee can apply once they are off contract). I don't know where he is from or care to look his law up. But it appears that the contract notion should read "carriers are obligated by law to unlock any
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My point is that there *IS* no real distinction between a phone that was purchased for use with a particular provider but was never actually under a contract, and a phone which has previously been under a contract and the contract has since expired. One could theoretically simply switch to a different provider after the contract was up, and since it was never actually under any contract with them, and electronically identical to a phone that might have been bought for use with the first provider, but was
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You're always free to not buy locked phones.
The real story here is that... (Score:1)
A bill was signed into law! Lately bills either stop at the senate or things get done with executive orders.
Somebody school me ... (Score:2)
... where in Sam Hill did the Librarian of Congress gain this influence?
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Apparently from the DMCA, which is the real root of this issue (and a lot of others...). That is what needs radical changing, if not outright repeal.
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Apparently from the DMCA, which is the real root of this issue (and a lot of others...). That is what needs radical changing, if not outright repeal.
Not really. There is nothing wrong with laws preventing people from illegally copying copyrighted works. It's just that in the case of mobile phone unlocking, I can't quite see where someone would be illegally copying some copyrighted works.
And... (Score:5, Insightful)
...absolutely nothing has changed. People have been unlocking their phones; people will continue to unlock their phones; and if Congress re-outlaws it, people will still continue to unlock their phones.
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If providers are going to have to unlock phones then I can see them changing things up a bit. Instead of the phone company 'subsidizing' your phone which you are allowed to keep when your contract is up, I see plans that include a lease fee for the phone with a n
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T-Mobile has been taking full advantage of the difficulty of jailbreaking. Their monthly rates are attractively low, but they do their absolute best to _insist_ that you buy a new phone from them instead of migrating your old phone, and their sales people do their level best to discount even the _possibility_ of such an option. So they've turned around the old model of "free or cheap phones, the money comes from their monthly bills" and separating the costs. This allows them to advertise as the "cheapest",
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Not the experience I had talking to a T-Mobile guy a few months back. Showed them my old phone, they told me to get it unlocked by my old carrier, and they'd be good to go....
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How long ago did you do this? Your experience is completely opposite from mine, less than 3 months ago.
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Maybe you ran into a guy who did that, but TMobile promotes it pretty well on their stores and their web page, and before they had iphones they had radio ads encouraging people to just use an unlocked iphone.
I looked into prices for my wife and I, and even without the subsidized phone (and using expensive phones paid off per the month) TMobile was substantially cheaper than AT&T or Verizon. For a family of four, AT&T becomes cheapest, with its family plans.
You could say that all the different price
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I went to their page. Then I tried to actually _use_ the "switch to us and keep your old phone", which they'd advertised extensively, and I ran into a series of forms and options that did not actually allow keeping phones. I will admit that I was looking for a family plan, that made it more intriguing. (I pay for my parents' phone bills, they're retired and it's the least I can do to stay in touch.)
Not when I switched (Score:2)
I wanted to keep my phone and they were fine with that. They just warned me that they'd had other customers try with that phone, and it had issues with data. I already had an unlocked phone (Verizon has to unlock their phones since they use Block C airspace) and I'd rooted it and put on a stock ROM so it wouldn't whine about being on a different carrier.
The sales guy gave me his SIM and I tried it. Voice worked great, but data was flakey. Kept trying to sync up at 4G, dropping back down, etc, etc. I decided
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They didn't offer to jailbreak the phone for me, in part I'm sure because at the time they couldn't legally, but they certainly didn't mind if I tried, they just warned me of potential issues.
This is one of the things I like most about T-Mobile. They don't care WHAT you do on their network, as long as you're paying for it. I had an HTC One X on AT&T and I had to flash a different CID onto it in order to use HTC's developer tools (e.g. unlock the bootloader so I could install a custom ROM), as AT&T made them disable the feature for phones locked to their network; I then had to flash the stock CID back in order for my AT&T SIM to work. T-Mobile? When I went into the store to buy my M7,
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Our elected congress never directly outlawed it. This rule, like so many others, came from an unelected bureaucrat.
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Somewhat OT, why does the 2nd link (BTC) in your sig redirect to "https://coinurl.com/index.php" ??
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Looks like something broke.
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Or maybe the FSP got hacked :(
BTW I like your home page, quite retro-tech. And why don't we see you over on SoylentNews or Pipedot? you're everywhere else. :)
ineffective political pandering (Score:1)
Your Verizon phone likely will still only work on Verizon, and this may make phones and phone service a little more expensive down the road, and it may kill some business models that could have brought phones to the poor with no monthly charges, but who cares! Well-off, politically connected geeks can now unlock their phones officially! A victory for democracy!
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T-mobile to go. You can get a phone and the first year of service for $120 (20 for the phone and 100 for initial Gold membership), and then you only need to put on $10 per YEAR to keep it going (as long as you don't use up too many minutes, so it makes a good emergency phone).
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Please, prey tell, how this will make phone service more expensive. Explain to us all how enabling a free market economy makes things more expensive, while vendor lock in results in lower cost to the consumer. I can't wait to hear your explanation.
Bear in mind while explaining that this allows people to switch to a lower cost service rather than be locked into a hig
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If you switch phone carriers, that's a big loss to your phone company. Providing locked phones are one of several mechanisms by which a company can insure against that loss and they are willing to give you a discount for that. In different words, they pay you an insurance premium, same way you pay car insurance.
And by further standardizing phone service terms, it will likely also lead to a weeding out of MVNOs, which have been thriving on of
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If someone switches phone carriers to my phone company, that's a big gain for my phone company!
No. You are confusing discounted handsets with discounted rates (the latter of which don't exist.)
So
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> and it may kill some business models that could have brought phones to the poor with no monthly charges
If a potential business model relies on creating a captive market via legislated freedom removal, it's a bad business model, full stop. Cell phone subsidization plans are already protected by contract law. The additional criminalization of unlocking is unnecessary.
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You'd see it right there on the table next to you if you took your head out of your ass.
OMG (Score:1, Flamebait)
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Thanks for your insightful contribution that doesn't suck.
DMCA (Score:1)
The DMCA is one of the single-handedly most stupid laws that has ever been passed in the US! Pretty much every stupid lawsuit and dumb statute you guys have falls under the DMCA! It's clear that lobbiest really did get to the government to pass this dumb act!
They had to get the *President* in on this one? (Score:2)
On Friday President Obama signed into a law a bill allowing mobile devices to be legally unlocked
Good news and all, but did it really have to go up to the President? No wonder he hasn't had time to get around to closing Guantanamo Bay if he has to do with (relatively) piddling crap like this!
Re:They had to get the *President* in on this one? (Score:5, Informative)
So yes, it went to the president, just like every other bill that has gotten through congress.
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You almost got the procedure. The US President has 10 days (not including Sundays) to sign or veto a bill. If the US President chooses to neither sign nor veto a bill, then it depends upon whether Congress is in session or not; if Congress is not in session then it becomes a "pocket veto" [wikipedia.org], if Congress is in session at the 10 day mark then it becomes law without the President signing it (see Aticle 1, Section 7, Clause 3 [wikipedia.org]).
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...and even if he doesn't sign it, it becomes law anyway, as long as Congress is in session.
will be pontless if it sticks (Score:2)
We will just see more incompatibly between networks. A lot ilke if you have an unlocked cmda phone today.. Where you going to go other than back to verizon? Each phone will end up with custom firmware, so you are stuck with that carrier.
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We will just see more incompatibly between networks. A lot ilke if you have an unlocked cmda phone today.. Where you going to go other than back to verizon? Each phone will end up with custom firmware, so you are stuck with that carrier.
First of all, Verizon is not the only CDMA carrier in the USA. (Sprint, for example, uses CDMA.) Verizon can't "break" their version of CDMA without making it impossible for non-Verizon subscribers to roam on their network.
Second, many of the phones currently available in the USA support all CDMA and GSM network protocols. Some even support them at all of the frequencies used outside North America, so you can roam in other continents.
Third, many phones from CDMA carriers now come with a removable SIM car
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ok i should have said 'where can you realistically go'. verizon was a quick example. I do know its not 100% black and white ( i even have a phone that does both cmda and gsm with 2 sims, at the same time ) but realistically most people will be stuck with what they buy from their carrier and not have more capable phones
and yes they can all 'break' their network so you can only use their "approved" phones, if they want to. they just dont have/want to yet. if this goes further and they are forced to start
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If you have a Verizon worldphone with GSM support you have more options. I'm switching over to a GSM provider soon and will be curious to see what happens when a different SIM is used in the US.
As long as... (Score:1)
You outright own your phone (EG it is not still under contract) there is no reason' you shouldn't be able to do any damn thing you please with it.
This only addresses half of the problem (Score:2)
Another benefit this would have is that manufacturers would start selling phones directly instead of only
SIM locks? (Score:2)
I wonder why the comments are filled with discussion about SIM locks and operators unlocking or not the devices after the end of contract. SIM-lock issue is no biggie, you can always simply buy the phone without telco as middleman.
What's more important there is that without this DMCA exception, you can't legally "jailbreak" your phone, install your own operating system or some "custom ROMs". Without this exception, jailbreaking an iPhone to install Cydia is illegal; breaking into bootloader of some non-unlo
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You might be outside the US, but you literally cannot purchase a phone in the US without specifying which carrier you're going to bind that phone to, contractually. Not Samsung/HTC/LG/Motorola/Google, not Microsoft, not Nokia, not iPhone and not BlackBerry.
So you're luck to be outside the US. For the rest of us, we're stuck paying full price for phones off-contract, and st
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It's a myth and I've already seen a lot of people from US debunking it. And even if it would be somewhat true, there are people in US who use their Openmoko Neo Freerunners and Goldelico GTA04s, or who preordered their Neo900, which were never (and never will be) locked to anything other than operating frequency.
Buying a phone in the US without simlock is far from being impossible. It's just a bit harder - well, for some people the difference may be negligible, but then no regulation will help them...
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Jailbreaking an iPhone is actually legal. It was an exemption granted the last DMCA round.
Now, Apple doesn't want you to, mostly because the vast majority of jailbreakers use it to
"Doesn't guarantee permanent legality", WTF (Score:2)
This should be bloody obvious to anyone with the mentality of an everage 12 year old or greater, but there is no guarantee that ANY law stay in effect permanently. You can supercede any law at any time just by passing a new law. Hell, you can even amend the Constitution. If you supersede the fiftth amendment and then pass a law enabling the cops to beat you with a rubber hose to extract a confession, you couldn't even (legally) refuse to incriminate yourself any more.
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Ahem. Laws don't "expire", but that's why I suppose you chose to post that comment under AC, instead of a proper username.
If they were serious about passing this... (Score:1)
If they were serious about passing this as law they should have made it permanent. It is ridiculous how this keeps bouncing back and forth between being illegal and legal.
Librarian? (Score:1)
1 out of 3 aint bad (Score:2)
While in another year it may well become illegal to root your phone and crack boot loaders at least you won't be breaking the law when you SIM unlock.
The only reason piecemeal temporary exemptions exist is restrictions are overwhelmingly seen as illegitimate and completely unenforceable.
Get rid of the DMCA (Score:2)
The obvious fix is to get rid of the DMCA.
I don't understand why exemptions are even allowed to be a thing.
Wait... a law saying something *isn't* illegal? (Score:1)
Is it legal for me to take a shower? Quick, get the president to sign a law giving me this freedom!
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You are right, Mr. Smith. We should not permit administrative law. But, the voters do, and will most likely continue to do so indefinitely. A fatal flaw of majority rule.