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Bill allowing smartphone unlocking approved by the House of Representatives, set to become law

iphone-5s-hero-l-201311After the decision last year to make unlocking smartphone and tablet devices illegal, the US House of Representatives today voted yes to allow the practice to become legal once again. This is already the second time the government has voted on this issue, as just a few weeks ago the US Senate approved the legislation to move on to the House. The final step in getting the law approved is the President’s signature, which should come with little delay as he has already spoken out in favor of the bill.

If you’re unclear as to what exactly this means for you, unlocking a phone allows you to use it on any compatible carrier (i.e. GSM) without being restricted to the original carrier.

This means if you purchased an AT&T smartphone, but then moved to Canadian carrier, you can legally unlock the device without jumping through hoops. It’s unclear when the specific date when unlocking phones will become legal again, but nevertheless, the wait is soon to be over.

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Comments

  1. ibitebcareful - 10 years ago

    “It’s unclear when the specific date when unlocking phones will become legal again, but nevertheless, the wait is soon to be over.” – As it should be!

  2. Taste_of_Apple - 10 years ago

    Reblogged this on Taste of Apple and commented:
    Good news for customers and users of all types of smartphones. If we purchase the phones then we should have the ability to unlock them.

  3. claytonkimball - 10 years ago

    Is this bill referring to forcing carriers to unlock your phone for you? The article seems to suggest unlocking is something you can do yourself, but has been illegal (which sounds more like jail breaking). Is it referring to a couple years ago when it was easy to find sites that would slip your IMEI through some back door?
    Ideally I think all phones should be automatically unlocked at the end of the contract, whether by paying at ETF or at the end of your 2 years. And unsubsidized phones should never be locked.

    • I agree with you about unsubsidized phones being unlocked. Purchase my iPhone 5 for $649 CAD when it was new to later find out I had to pay the carrier another $50 in order to unlock it.

  4. scumbolt2014 - 10 years ago

    So the Senile Senate finally did something this quarter. They must be exhausted and ready to take a month off away at their summer homes, the assholes.

    • standardpull - 10 years ago

      I’ll take unlocking. But I agree that there are still so many unhandled issues that Congress totally failed at, like Net Neutrality and the basics of doing their job. Ineptitude in the House is the name of the game. This is perhaps the one ultimately minor exception.

  5. Last I read it would still be illegal to unlock a phone that is on contract, I’m not sure if that is still the case but something to think about before you go running into the wireless store to have them unlock your device.

  6. Edison Wrzosek - 10 years ago

    The only thing I still have issue with, especially where the millions of Android and WP devices are concerned, is even though the device becomes unlocked, it’s still been contaminated with the excessive amounts of carrier bloatware, which in many cases is hard-coded into the ROM of the device. This bill should also require the carriers to remove all their bloatware, which I may add in many cases tracks its users even after the device has been moved to another carrier. Also, the carriers often set the AGPS functionality to run exclusively thru their gateway, and later when the device is moved to a new network, people find the AGPS fails. This leaves the the device owner with the tedious task of having to root and custom ROM the device.

    This bill is only half baked, which is what I expect from an impotent government like the US Government.

  7. Here in Germany it has become common practice that subsidized phones you’ve gotten through a contract already come unlocked which leads to the huge advantage of popping in a cheap prepaid simcard of a local carrier in if you stay in a different country for a while and avoid expensive charges from you carrier back home even though EU roaming has become a lot cheaper anyways.

    Since I’m about to immigrate to the states and will probably go back to Europe for vacation or to visit friends and family every now and then it would be interesting to know if this new bill is just about unlocking phones that are past the two years mark of your contract. Being from a country where the wireless market is so different and considerably cheaper than in the states it seems to be a no-go not being able to use the service of a local carrier wherever you are especially with the exorbitant prices U.S. carriers charge you when you’re abroad.

    One more thing: Correct me if I’m wrong but Sprint (and therefore Ting) iPhones don’t even have a simcard slot, right? So, how does that work if I want to migrate to a different carrier or use a different simcard abroad? Doesn’t that make that practice… well, not sure if “illegal” is the right word, but yeah? Especially since most carriers around the world still use simcards (yet again, afaik)…