[Digitaltrends] Unlocking your smartphone will soon be illegal - Page 18  

Originally Posted by BBEG 




I'll kindly ask you to refrain from generalizing about my country if you're not going to do it intelligently or accurately. The USA is not the only country where phones can be carrier-locked, nor is the media association "more important than anything". We've all got national issues, including the Netherlands and Spain, so let's try demonstrating a little critical thought on a tech forum, hm?

The clock to unlock a new mobile phone is running out.

In October 2012, the Librarian of Congress, who determines exemptions to a strict anti-hacking law called the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), decided that unlocking mobile phones would no longer be allowed. But the librarian provided a 90-day window during which people could still buy a phone and unlock it. That window closes on January 26.

Unlocking a phone frees it from restrictions that keep the device from working on more than one carrier's network, allowing it run on other networks that use the same wireless standard. This can be useful to international travellers who need their phones to work on different networks. Other people just like the freedom of being able to switch carriers as they please.

The new rule against unlocking phones won't be a problem for everybody, though. For example, Verizon's iPhone 5 comes out of the box already unlocked, and AT&T will unlock a phone once it is out of contract.

You can also pay full-price for a phone, not the discounted price that comes with a two-year service contract, to receive the device unlocked from the get-go. Apple sells an unlocked iPhone 5 starting at $649, and Google sells its Nexus 4 unlocked for $300. [See also: Can I Get a Smartphone Without a Contract?]

Advocacy group the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) questions whether the DMCA has the right to determine who can unlock a phone. In an email to TechNewsDaily, EFF attorney Mitch Stoltz said, "Arguably, locking phone users into one carrier is not at all what the DMCA was meant to do. It's up to the courts to decide."

If you do buy a new phone and want to unlock it before the deadline, you must first ask your carrier if the company will unlock your phone for you. The DMCA only permits you to unlock your phone yourself once you've asked your carrier first.

Originally Posted by zephiK 

Yeah seriously. We paid for our electronics, let us do whatever we want next. I wonder what absurd law they're going to think of doing next, "let's ban overclocking computers?"

Originally Posted by Search 


You just compared apples to oranges.

People overclock their CPUs for one reason: Performance.
People unlock their phones for a lot of reasons.

If I were a phone company.. I wouldn't want anyone unlocking a phone.

Why? People use it to get free stuff. They use it to circumvent spending money. They brick phones and then ask for replacements. Should we continue?

The day that people use their overclocked CPUs to play video games for free you will see motherboards get locked.

Am I saying I agree? I'm not commenting on it, but the "reason" is valid.

Originally Posted by Search 

You just compared apples to oranges.

People overclock their CPUs for one reason: Performance.
People unlock their phones for a lot of reasons.

If I were a phone company.. I wouldn't want anyone unlocking a phone.

Why? People use it to get free stuff. They use it to circumvent spending money. They brick phones and then ask for replacements. Should we continue?

The day that people use their overclocked CPUs to play video games for free you will see motherboards get locked.

Am I saying I agree? I'm not commenting on it, but the "reason" is valid.