Apple warned Monday that IPhone owners who have unlocked their handsets so they could use carriers other than AT&T may end up with a phone that doesn’t work after the company’s next software update.
Apple executives say they have discovered that many of those unauthorized unlocking programs cause some software damage to iPhones.
A software update that Apple plans to issue later this week will apparently add features such as accessibility to the iTunes Wi-Fi Music Store which may make the touch-screen cell phone completely inoperable if it has been hacked into.
“This has nothing to do with proactively disabling a phone that is unlocked or hacked,” Phil Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of worldwide product marketing, said in an interview. “It’s unfortunate that some of these programs have caused damage to the iPhone software, but Apple cannot be responsible for … those consequences.”
Members of the unofficial iPhone Dev Team that released free iPhone unlocking tools issued their own statement in which they claim as many as several hundred thousand iPhones have been unlocked worldwide using their tools. The statement also refutes Apple’s claim that the tools cause any damage to the iPhone. The group advises against installing any updates to the iPhone and promises its own update sometime next week.
John McLaughlin of Uniquephones.com, in Northern Ireland, has developed unlocking software, but his Belfast-based company hasn’t sold or distributed it. He called Apple’s warning “something of a scare tactic.” Anyone who has already unlocked their phone could get it back in working condition, he said.
“We have reviewed the source code of a number of these applications and to the best of our knowledge any changes made to the software can easily be reversed,” McLaughlin said in an e-mail. “After unlocking the iPhone, minimal effort is required to get it in to its previously locked state.”
Apple has sold more than 1 million iPhones since the product hit the market June 29. As with any Apple product, hacking into the iPhone voids its warranty.
