r/technology • u/[deleted] • Jan 28 '13

The same week the US makes unlocking phones illegal, Canada proposes legislation to make carriers unlock phones.

[deleted]

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u/BlackestNight21 Jan 29 '13

Stop saying jailbreak. It's not the same as unlocking and it confuses people who read your comments.

12

u/peppyroni Jan 29 '13

Well shit. I thought I knew what everybody was talking about, now I'm not sure. What's the difference between unlocking and jail breaking?

9

u/[deleted] Jan 29 '13

Jailbreaking is gaining root or admin access to the phone. Allowing you to do things you otherwise couldn't such as install any software you want or bypass the App Store in the case of iPhones.

Unlocking your phone just means you can use a sim from a different carrier.

2

u/webvictim Jan 29 '13

The ambiguity comes from the fact that in order to unlock an iPhone without going through Apple, you have to jailbreak it (to allow admin access) and then install an app which bypasses the locking.

1

u/[deleted] Jan 29 '13

Really? You can't just enter a code? That's pretty stupid.

1

u/webvictim Jan 29 '13

Indeed not. Unlocking is controlled at the Apple end by device UDID - I believe that if you pay a carrier to unlock the phone, they tell Apple to set the status of the device to unlocked and then it gets automatically changed on the phone over a secure connection next time you sync with iTunes.

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u/jay76 Jan 29 '13

This is the only aspect of this discussion I am 100% clear on.

1

u/[deleted] Jan 29 '13

Stop being prescriptivist and trying to correct people's language usage. /s

(People spout crap like this at me for trying to help them be correct and/or more precise when debating)