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Tuesday, January 29, 2013

Unlocking Smartphones Rendered Illegal by Librarian's Baffling Decision

Unlocking Smartphones Rendered Illegal by Librarian's Baffling Decision

By Wayne Rash  |  Posted 2013-01-27

NEWS ANALYSIS: In yet another unintended consequence of some very flawed legislation, it’s now illegal to unlock any phone you purchase after Jan. 26.

The Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998 has been the source of both controversy and consternation since it became law 15 years ago. Because of the DMCA, it became illegal to defeat the encryption on a DVD you purchased so you could watch a movie on your Linux computer.

 It became illegal to make a binary copy of a movie so you could watch it on your iPad. Now, because the Librarian of Congress has decided it to be this way, it’s now illegal to unlock phones purchased on or after Jan. 26.

 No doubt you’re asking yourself several questions. First, how is it that the DMCA has anything to do with phones? Second, why does the Librarian of Congress have anything to do with whether phone unlocking is illegal? We could go on from there. Read more...
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2 comments:

  1. The updated information is.....It is now legal to get our phones unlocked from third party unlocking services in U.S. Recently, I unlocked my mobile .I had to travel outside my country and I had to unlock it very quickly. My network provider prolonged the unlock process...and luckily the amendment of unlocking phone made legal saved my time. I used the service from Superunlockcodes.com and removed the network lock very easily. They unlocked my phone within few hours....

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