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iPhone unlocked. AT&T loses iphone exclusivity!

engadget.com — t'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.

Who dugg this? Made popular Aug 24, 2007

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  • ronin691, on 11/05/2007, -15/+340...Uh oh, someone just ***** in AT&T's cereal. Sincere thank you to the l33t guys who worked so hard to unlock the iPhone.
  • fishbert, on 10/10/2007, -4/+280I guess iPhone software version 1.0.3 will be coming sooner than expected...
  • Slippy, on 10/10/2007, -10/+279Best news i've had all day.
  • Sarawanan, on 10/10/2007, -6/+214If Apple doesn't release the iPhone in Canada by the end of 2007, I'm buying this.
  • batmant, on 10/10/2007, -3/+172I bet Steve is laughing his ass off right now. He made the Jesus phone Asia could never produce. Then he signs a 5-year exclusivity deal knowing full damn well what his community will do with the thing once it's on the market. Then, it all comes to fruition and iPhone sales go up even further (at least through the Apple store). Ten bucks says Apple doesn't do a thing to prevent this (a la Apple TV).
  • mccarron, on 10/10/2007, -1/+125As we discuss this, everyone at Apple is discussing how they were just told they are working the weekend. ;)
  • joe90210, on 10/10/2007, -1/+116why would you want to use the iPhone in Canada? so those ***** at Rogers can charge you 45455656$ for 25megs a month and then charge another 456565656$ for every extra meg you use?
  • nitrousconsumed, on 11/03/2007, -7/+70Or you can just buy the iPhone at the Apple Store, thus eliminating you signing any contract.
  • diggmaddy, on 10/10/2007, -4/+64Probably the best news T-Mobile (and their users) will hear all day too :D.
    Honestly, evil AT&T was the ONLY reason I had not bought the iPhone till now. It's going to change soon (well, as soon as these guys release it to general public). I wonder how much they'll sell it for!
  • mobilehavoc, on 10/10/2007, -7/+61Does anyone realize apart from Apple/AT&T going after the iphonesimfree.com folks they can just as easily provide a list of iPhone IMEI numbers to T-Mobile to stop people from using them on T-Mobile's network? Everytime you register on a GSM network your SIM ICCID and handset's IMEI are registered as well. Makes it easy for carriers to block/blacklist phones if they want. This is all assuming they can't just release an update that resolves this.

    In other words, I highly doubt the longevity of this hack.
  • diggmaddy, on 10/10/2007, -0/+53But why would T-Mobile do that? This is in fact good news for T-Mobile. Less people will switch to AT&T just to use the iPhone.
  • Visceral, on 10/10/2007, -7/+58Next Weeks headline: Apple re-locks iPhone. Suck it.
  • TimmyGUNZ, on 10/10/2007, -2/+51I can see it now:

    Steve: "We're sorry guys, there's nothing we can do to re-lock this phone."
    AT&T: "Ugh"
  • wurk4fude, on 10/10/2007, -17/+66*explosion* the rebels just took out the death star.
  • taylorcarrigan, on 04/02/2008, -3/+45Nice. I was on AT&T before the iPhone came out, so I didn't have the ambition to switch to another network when I got my iPhone, but it's great news for those outside the US. Also, yeah, you can just walk into an Apple store and buy an iPhone--no signing contracts or anything.
  • mrASSMAN, on 10/10/2007, -6/+47No one likes ***** in their cereal.
  • dasunst3r, on 10/10/2007, -5/+44This brings up fresh memories from this article: http://consumerist.com/consumer/iphone/iphone-locked-to-cingular-but-bad-guys-might-unlock-it-228168.php

    These iPhone unlockers are not the bad guys. AT&T and Apple are the bad guys for making a defective by design, locked-down phone, and I sure as heck do not pay $600 for anything and have someone tell me what I can/can't do with it (so long as I don't deprive other people of the resources they paid for).
  • laurentlasalle, on 10/10/2007, -3/+40This, of course, doesn't changes anything for us poor canadians... We'll still be stuck with Rogers, the only GSM Network provider here!
  • fuzzmeister, on 10/10/2007, -0/+35Why, exactly, would T-Mobile willingly prevent people from using their service?
  • ttntyler, on 10/10/2007, -3/+35I'm just going to use WiFi for data and the Rogers network for phone calls.. Better than nothing..
  • daeggman, on 10/10/2007, -3/+34What the **** is an aluminum falcon?
  • aprocter, on 10/10/2007, -1/+31I'm with you on that one. They should also start offering TV shows and Movies on the ITS. I think they hate us :-(
  • TimmyGUNZ, on 10/10/2007, -3/+30No they don't, you set up your contract when you activate it.
  • mobilehavoc, on 10/10/2007, -10/+34Nice...more sales for Apple = higher AAPL stock price = PROFIT!!!!
  • batmant, on 10/10/2007, -2/+26well eBay certainly benefits from this
  • Charron, on 10/10/2007, -0/+23"I eat pieces of ***** like you for breakfast!"
    "You eat pieces of ***** for breakfast?"
  • sanarchy, on 10/10/2007, -1/+23Just buy the iPhone at an Apple Store and use iActivator or any other number of tools to bypass activation through AT&T. Read the article my friend.
  • in2deep, on 10/10/2007, -3/+25This is crazy....should be interesting to see what happens from here!
  • fiorenza, on 10/10/2007, -8/+29TMobile here I come.
  • BaylorDawg, on 10/10/2007, -4/+25uhhh... I doubt ATT is too concerned... considering the VAST majority of Iphone users will be using ATT. I would be surprised if more than 1% of people choose to use the Iphone with a different carrier.
  • morestar, on 10/10/2007, -2/+22exactly, Rogers and every frucken provider in Ontario Canada is ripping us off...aboout 4.8 years ago Fido went all locals calls for free and less than 6 onths later Rogers bought them out and took away the option from their plans.

    Sick!
  • inactive, on 10/10/2007, -4/+23Theres always someone though......
  • Kardde, on 10/10/2007, -2/+21I don't know what's more sad. That you actually posted that as the first comment on the article, or that I actually know what it's in reference to.

    God, I think it's the latter.
  • evanmorris, on 10/10/2007, -4/+21Read the article and watch the video before you start saying it's fake. Looks like they have first-hand experience with an unlocked iPhone.
  • TimmyGUNZ, on 10/10/2007, -1/+17I highly doubt the entire iPhone Dev Team spent all their resources trying to make the phone unlockable. The only company having the phone remain closed benefits is AT&T. I'm sure some at Apple are quietly excited by this because it will only increase the demand for iPhones.
  • Night201, on 10/10/2007, -3/+19What about this article from MSNBC about a kid in NJ who cracked it (but had to solder it though)?

    http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20424880/
  • robotsongs, on 10/10/2007, -0/+16where the ***** did that come from ?! Dugg for randomness.
  • mechamat, on 10/10/2007, -0/+15Canada should allow international communication companies in. Rogers and Bell do not deserve the freedom to gauge they have now. I called around asking about the iTunes stuff and a rep mentioned the holdup has to do with our legal issues. Probably the CRTC. I say screw favouring canadian content (most of it sucks), give me the world. Who's with me :D Rabble, rabble, rabble, rabble, rabble, rabble, rabble...
  • diggmaddy, on 10/10/2007, -0/+15There's JUST ONE exclusive feature for iPhone on AT&T network and that is Visual Voicemail. Apart from that, ALL other features are easily accessible on any other network! BTW, Verizon and Sprint use CDMA (and iPhone is GSM, if you're not aware of that yet), so no amount of software/hardware hacking can make the iPhone work on those networks. Within the US, it's great news for T-Mobile users who were drooling over the iPhone and didn't want to switch (which includes me.).
  • inactive, on 10/10/2007, -0/+14good news, for the record alot of people on the engadget page commented on at&t or apple sending cease and desist letters to the hackers, they wont, unlocking a product you already own is perfectly legal, the only grey area would be if you hacked it to use on at&t but bypass any charges for it in some way and im not even sure it'll invalidate your warranty as your only circumventing a software lock, (in the uk it doesn't invalidate warranty so i assume its the same in the us) if you broke the case open and hardware modded it however it would.
    Another point is that from the article i got the impression that every function worked on it apart from the visual voice mail, that's not a big deal for alot of people :-)
  • inactive, on 10/10/2007, -0/+14"They made it unhackable, but that doesn't mean we don't hack it." ~Bioshock
  • signal15, on 10/10/2007, -3/+17TMO has unlimited data plans for like $20 a month.

    Additionally, the only thing that doesn't work when on TMO is the visual voicemail. You can still call your VM box though. Even the Youtube stuff works if you know how to activate it.
  • TheMidnight, on 10/10/2007, -1/+14Um, yeah, I'm going to have to ask you to work on Saturday this week. We've lost some security and we need to play a little catchup. Oh yeah, I almost forgot, I'm going to need you to come in on Suuunday too. Okay? Great. Thanks!
  • qwickone, on 10/10/2007, -1/+14Why dont you RTFA before you post questions that are answered there?
  • bradleyjx, on 10/10/2007, -0/+131) You can purchase an iPhone without a contract.
    2) Most carriers only charge you for a plan and give you a SIM card for a phone. They don't care what phone that card goes into.
    3) The plan is mostly just an "X minute, unl. data" plan with random other perks; other carriers have similar plans, just without the exclusive perks.
  • TimmyGUNZ, on 10/10/2007, -1/+14Would they be able to stop them, with the law allowing the unlocking of cell phones? From my understanding of that law, it's not illegal for companies to make phones locked to a network, but it's ALSO not illegal for people to unlock them.
  • LiquidFusion, on 10/10/2007, -1/+13Digg up for the reference to one of DS9's great episodes: In the Pale Moonlight.
  • KennMac, on 10/10/2007, -2/+14Unfortunately you can't fit 104 keys on a small touchscreen. You're going to have to get over it and move on.
  • inactive, on 10/10/2007, -0/+12*****... maybe if the phone was stolen. UNLOCKING is LEGAL. You'd be breaking the law.
  • godofpumpkins, on 10/10/2007, -0/+11why would T-Mobile be required to enforce a contract between two other companies?
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