Unlocking iPhone Would Be Illegal Starting January 2013!

Surprise surprise, this is something non of you would have expected. Unlocking iPhone’s would be illegal starting January 2013. Yes folks this has been confirmed. New DMCA ruling will soon make it illegal to unlock iPhone.

iPhone Unlocking illegal

Recently factory unlocking iPhone’s suddenly took a real boom. The reason? Well it seems that many companies found out a way to factory unlock iPhones. What it is that, it caused a huge price drop in factory unlocks. Previously people could get their iPhone factory unlocked but for a huge price somewhere close to $200. Now it’s the other way round. Factory unlocks have taken a major dive and the prices are as low as $20.

That’s a great thing, right? Well it is, but unfortunately it will soon come to an end. When exactly?

January 2013.

Starting from January 2013, unlocking iPhone’s would be illegal. Yes folks, this is a big NO NO for you. So how did this iPhone unlocking suddenly become illegal? And, who is responsible for it?

Congress Considers Unlocking iPhone illegal

Congress has now considered unlocking iPhone to be illegal. Well not exactly right now, but it was in the pipeline for quite sometime.

New DMCA ruling from the library of Congress will make unlocking your iPhone illegal starting the first month of next year. Now this would definitely sound bad but actually it’s not as bad as you are thinking.

Back in 2006 and 2010, Library of Congress ruled that unlocking iPhone would be completely illegal but now it has turned 90 degrees. Starting 2013, iPhone unlocking would be (almost) illegal. Why the word “almost illegal”? Well you would still be able to unlock iPhone but with the permission from your carrier, which almost makes it impossible to legally unlock iPhone.

The new DMCA would make iPhone’s purchased after January 2013 to be not illegible to be unlocked but those purchased before would still be able to get it unlocked.

While the new rules do contain a provision allowing phone unlocking, it comes with a crippling caveat: the phone must have been “originally acquired from the operator of a wireless telecommunications network or retailer no later than ninety days after the effective date of this exemption.”

So if you are planning to get an iPhone 5 and want to unlock it, you better hurry up.

Why Unlocking iPhone To Be Illegal

Congress considers two main reasons why they think unlocking an iPhone would be illegal. The first is that; when you purchase a software you do not actually own it, you rather simply license it according to End User License Agreement. In basic words it means you can use the software but can’t make changes to it, thus unlocking iPhone to be illegal.

The second reason Congress mentioned was that there are way too many unlocked phones in the market compared to those locked ones. Which is kind of bad for carriers as they lose much of their revenue from locked iPhones.

So is this is the end of the world for you? Absolutely not, there would still be plenty of ways from which you would be able to unlock iPhone, although not legal