tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4453670003044489652.post-71400651795184366332007-08-30T09:06:00.000-07:002007-08-30T09:08:02.427-07:00Is Your iPhone Legal?From: the Wall Street Journal Online<br /><br />"A 17-year-old “unlocked” the iPhone last week, making it possible to use the cell phone on networks operated by carriers other than its current exclusive carrier, AT&T. Now the lawyers and entrepreneurs are getting involved, highlighting how businesses are struggling to balance innovation with tech-savvy customers, and a legal system that isn’t designed for either.<br />Hackers have been trying to unlock the iPhone since it came out at the end of June. George Hotz, the teenager who finally pulled it off, just sold his unlocked iPhone to CertiCell, a mobile-phone repair company, for a Nissan 350Z and three new iPhones, according to the <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/28/AR2007082800328.html?nav=rss_technology">Washington Post</a>. Hotz will also get a paid consulting job with the company.<br />Hotz could have held out for more. An anonymous entrepreneur is offering $100,000 for the rights to distribute software that unlocks the iPhone, according to <a href="http://www.engadget.com/2007/08/28/100-000-offered-to-freely-release-iphone-unlocking-software/">Engadget</a>, which establishes that there is – or at least should be – a market for it.<br />One person who probably hopes software that unlocks the iPhone becomes widely available is John Canning of Vermont. AT&T doesn’t provide service in Vermont or Alaska, and it has threatened to cancel the contracts of any residents in those states who buy an iPhone. Canning bought the iPhone anyway, according to <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/tech/wireless/phones/2007-08-27-vermont-iphone_N.htm">USA Today</a>. An AT&T spokesperson told USA Today that people who live in places where AT&T doesn’t offer service shouldn’t buy the iPhone – an attitude that the Business Technology Blog thinks largely explains why people are so eager to unlock the device.<br />The catch, of course, is that unlocking the iPhone is a legal gray area. There is an exception in the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, the major intellectual property law, which, believe it or not, specifies that it isn’t a crime to unlock a cell phone for personal use, according to an IDG New Service <a href="http://www.infoworld.com/article/07/08/27/Unlocking-iPhone-could-invite-DMCA-suit_1.html">article</a>. Several intellectual property lawyers told IDG that unlocking the iPhone for personal use was probably fine. But sharing the method with others – either for profit or not – is a gray area, the lawyers said, largely because no one has ever tried to use a copyright to enforce an exclusive contract. It may be legal, the lawyers say, but it is more or less inviting a lawsuit. Certainly, AT&T has every incentive to fight people who try to distribute the secret of unlocking the iPhone, since it risks losing customers otherwise. And, in fact, an Irish man who has also unlocked the iPhone <a href="http://blogs.business2.com/apple/2007/08/iphone-unlock-h.html?section=money_technology">says </a>that he heard from AT&T lawyers this past weekend. "Magnum Opushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09204869745681481124noreply@blogger.com