Jail breaking iphone legal?

[Peter1234123]

I was wondering if anyone knew if jail breaking an iPhone was legal or not? I mean, it's your hardware, hardware is sold to you without a liscence, for the most part, so, I wouldn't see why not, PLUS I am a minor, so I couldn't agree to a contract if they sold it with one ;), and...the only thing that I see that could make it illegal is if there was a provision in AT&T's contract. Anyone have any info?

[mister_pink]

I'd have thought that it would be in breach of your contract. But I'm not a lawyer. And you don't really seem all that bothered anyway! As long as you keep paying the contract for the minimum term I don't suppose they'll mind. And as for "it's your hardware", it seems like nothing you buy these days is ever really yours. Thats the beauty of the open community!

[cus1984]

you would only be voiding your warranty, so if you accidently wipe everything from it, the manufacturer will not replace it.

[saj0577]

You may not sign the contract but your parents may have. yes?

Saj

[nhandler]

I'm not sure of the legality, but I have one question for you. How in the world would AT&T/Apple ever know that you jailbroke you iPhone? I don't know about you, but I don't have employees from my cellphone carrier randomly stopping by my house to make sure I haven't tampered with my phone. The only way they would ever know would be if you sent your phone to them. Since you can always unjailbreak your phone by installing the official apple iPhone firmware, you have nothing to worry about.

[NR1224]

Yes, its illegal. No way around it.:( No, you wont ever get caught, so do as you please.:)

[lackofcreativity]

Can someone please explain why this is on the Ubuntu forums?

[Peter1234123]

lackofcreativity, read the title of this forum. It says something like "Learn about Computers, Ubuntu and more" it does not say "don't post questions about computer devices" or anything like that, now does it?

[jflaker]

Not Illegal from a USAGE standpoint....


You will not get full functionality from your phone, or so they say.......
If the phone bricks, you are on your own...the warranty is void.
att&t and Apple will most likely NOT give you service, you will likely have to go anywhere else but at&t for cell service or Apple for hardware service
Many have done just that, but YOU ARE ON YOUR OWN SHOULD SOMETHING HAPPEN


Personally, I feel you should be able to buy hardware and then choose what or where you want to get services.......Apple gets a kickback from at&t for each phone activated...........

[bsharp]

Perhaps this should interest someone?
http://openmoko.com

I would go out and buy one right now if they had them :(

[Crafty Kisses]

Yeah, OpenMoko is really cool even though right now it's exclusively for developers, when it comes out though, I'll be getting one for sure. I mean come on, it's an open source phone, how can you go wrong with that?

[hanzomon4]

My personal stance on the license issue is this, If I'm sold something it's mine to do with as I please. I don't mean copying and selling it, I mean for my own personal use. I will treat software/hardware no different then a can of coke. Civil disobedience? Perhaps,but the way I see it the Law and the Courts have not adequately addressed the issue. The issue to me is whither or not tech is sold are licensed. Tech companies say they license their products but that flies in the face of common sense. I can understand tech companies having something like a copyright to protect the ideas behind their products but the ridiculously restrictive eulas go to far. It's so bad I'd imagine that if brought before a judge many parts of eulas would be considered illegal.

[perce]

I don't know if it's illegal because I'm not a lawyer, But I REALLY hope they'll sue you, because your case would get a lot of attention in the media and people would (hopefully) understand what there is under the surface of cool, young Apple's design.

This also the reason why you'd NEVER be sued on jailbreaking a iphone: it would be a major PR disaster for Apple.

[uraldinho]

Phones are a strange area. Most contract subscriptions subsidise the cost of the phone, so I presume you don't actually own the phone until the minimum term of the contract is over. But if you pay out the contract, the phone is yours. So, the SIM lock is justifiable.

Once the contract is over, maybe they should be legally obliged to unlock it for free so that you can use the device without restrictions. I suppose they get away with it, because they sell subscriptions not phones. What happens outside the subscription is not their responsibility.

I don't see why jailbreaking an iPhone should be illegal. You are bound by a contract to pay all your fees, and they are obliged to provide you with the services. However, if you tamper with the device, you lose your rights for free servicing.

[Kernel Sanders]

Things like this are not illegal. It's a violation of the EULA, but that's about it.

You can't be arrested for doing it, and you can only get sued if you happily provide Apple with clear and documented evidence of what you've done, and their lawyers remove their brains, and they decide to actually pursue you for something most/all of their legal iPod owners are doing anyway.

Worry not!

[rune0077]

Hey, I bought an iPhone when I was on vacation in the US a while back. I bought it in an Apple store, and when they figured that I was going to jailbreak it because I needed to use it in Europe, they even gave me a website-address with instructions on how to do it. So not illegal I suppose, but they did warn me that it would void the guarantee.

[myusername]

its not illegal. it just voids the warrenty

[captainsixxx]

Ok.. So now that we know about the iphone, I ask waht are the benefits of "jail-breaking" and how would I do that with the HTC Shadow, it has windows mobile 6 on it and it is a pretty unstable phone, I can't even use the software update they put out for it cause it causes the phone to randomly decide when to ring when someone calls in.