Firmware 2.0.1 breaks PwnageTool, could render iPhone 3G un-unlockable
By Thomas Ricker 
posted August 5th 2008 4:08AM
posted August 5th 2008 4:08AM
As some of you already know, updating your iPhone to firmware 2.0.1 means that you've lost access to all your jailbroken apps. That's pretty much expected and should be rectified by the DevTeam soon enough. What's notable from an unlocking perspective, however, is that Apple's 2.0.1 release also updates the iPhone 3G baseband. This puts iPhone 3G owners in a bit of a quandary: update now via iTunes in desperate hopes of the stability and improved keyboard response we've been seeing but do so at the risk of not being able to unlock your iPhone 3G in the future (if and when the DevTeam gets around to releasing it for firmware 2.0). A lot can happen in the course of a 2 year (or longer) carrier commitment. According to the DevTeam, you'll get all the benefits of Apple's 2.0.1 update (without the pesky new baseband) just as soon as they can kick out the updated PwnageTool (current version is 2.0.1) onto the Internets. Decisions, decisions.
How is this new? Every firmware broke unlocks\jailbreaks.
This isn't actually true... The firmwares never wrote over the baseband, so once the dev team came out with Pwnage, which unlocks the baseband directly, it seemed like the phone would be permanently unlocked even through firmware upgrades... But apple can is apparently going to be writing over the baseband too now... But, like anything, it will be hacked, eventually. People are insanely resourceful, and no slab of hardware is unhackable. If it was engineered by a few people, 1000 hackers the world over will eventually be able to figure out what was done.
You can't stop the signal.
-Taylor
it took me a while to confirm the comment..
Hmmm... so you posted before me, then I posted, then you confirmed your post... It makes sense, but Engadget should either change the order, make the timestamp reflect when the comment was posted instead of when it's confirmed, or suffer the extremely infrequent occasions in which people complain of such apparent time paradoxes. I think I've posted way too many times in this article, way too many times off topic, and way too many times in the past hour...
Why buy a broken device that you have to fix yourself?
Stop bitching about the iPhone. Face it the iPhone us pretty much one of the most innovative things to happen to cellular devices in a long time. It has changed the way we think about a cell phone. It has challenged other phone companies to step there game up, and it has also brought about some competition in this oligopoly that we call the "Big 4". It brought in gadgetry to the masses. Samsung sold what, like their 100,000,000 unit last week, yeah well apple is hoping to have 40,000,000 iphone units out in hands this year they are official a big player in my book. So you have to give the damn thing some credit. I'm a blogger and I have stories on the iPhone all over the blogisphere and 9 times of 10 the story has an ass load of hits. People care about the iPhone, even when they say they don't care they care. It gets pages hits and that's essential what they want. You can't just ignore it, it's here to stay.
If we stopped bitching about the iPhone, that would be ignoring a very important aspect of it: what's bad about it. You can post only good news about the iPhone and get mostly fans to view the news along with a few people who don't like the iPhone or "claim" to not care, or you can post bad news and expect many more people who don't like the iPhone and maybe even more fans to take interest in the article. In order to get the most hits and make the gadget appear successful, bloggers should post both the good and the bad, and yes, that includes bitching.
They love the iphone bc it is a nice tool however that DOES NOT excuse its monopolistic trade and its tyrant company. Someone is a bit naiive...
To all the people to tell the people who are complaining to stop complaining:
Shutup.
It's good to see the problems of it coming to light as it gains in market share and whatever. Mkay?
Actually they had to go for phones if they wanted to increase their profits because mobile phone manufacturers where going to eat mp3 market totally at some point. Example Nokia has 71% of all mp3 player capable devices sold globally.
Iphone is popular that's for sure, but in sales it's not really even close to one single S40 phone(example 6500 slide). Many of these blogs have pretty big affect on what will people buy and pages like Engadget surely are doing their job. Iphone missing this amount of news in Asian and European market did take some of the magic from it.
i guess i'll have to go get an iphone from austrailia or something...screw AT&T, those bastards......
*yawn* This is the N95...
;)
It is amazing how much MARKETING can make one want a product that is very limited in functionality, pricing, contract, upgrading/updating and repairing. Apple and their carriers control EVERY ASPECT of this product, yet people are willing to sign up to be screwed.
Consumers are stupid and guys like Jobs prove it.
RAZR?
What the hell are you blabbing about.
Well, they don't call them:
iDiots
for nothing.
I really have no sympathy for Apple users that are getting screwed, because half the time they are too ignorant or too oblivious to even know it.
You're an idiot on so many levels.
Ok I'm sorry... what the hell is a baseband and what's wrong with it being overwritten? Wikipedia just has an article on modulated frequencies or something and I have no idea what that has to do with firmware.
I found this: http://www.unlocksiphone.com/
Someone knows this site or if this unlock really works with iPhone 3G as they say??
Would changes to the baseband help with reception?
Ran the update now my iPod Touch is bricked. There was no hacked software installed. Just shows the apple icon and iTunes locks up when I try to connect to my desktop. I feel like this software is still beta and we are all here as a test lab.
Android sounds better and better as more iPhone "news" gets posted
For the European and Asian members, FYI, it's common practice in the USA for carriers to lock a phone to their network for an amount of time. When the original Razr was launched in the USA it was locked to Verizon and it was a long time before it was launched on with other vendors. What happened was that people would travel to the Europe pick one unlocked and come back to the USA and use it on ATT or T-Mobile.
So now you have the Verizon users complaining cause they want it but can't have it. Even if you picked up an unlock iPhone in Europe there are only two companies in the USA that can run it ATT and T-Mobile, what the Verizon users want is a CDMA version.
2.0.1 broke all downloaded apps from the App Store -- they crash immediately on load.
Haha,
Bottom Line: less than 5% of iPhones (in the US) will be unlocked and it will be in 70 countries by the end of the year, once they add China unlocking WILL disappear. Remote is probably the coolest piece of software I've ever used and makes everything else look like crap.
Oh yeah, unlocking VOIDS THE WARRANTY! That alone should keep people from doing this....the current Apple/ATT deal runs out in 2010, but it seems like ATT will hold on to this as long as they can (I've been a subscriber for years, anyway)
If you want an iPhone, ATT is it. Deal
bottom line is this: In America, like it or not, cell carriers have the right to lock the phone to their networks. Apple has NOTHING to do with locking phones, other than upholding a contract with AT&T.
Unlocked phones are great, and available for a cost. The fact of the matter is most people don't care. Most people don't travel internationally, and in the US, T-Mobile is the only other nationwide GSM carrier, so there's not really a lot of choice anyway.
If you choose to jailbreak or unlock your phone, you can. I do, and I know the risks. I wait on Apple updates until a new jailbreaker is ready. It's a choice I make. I could hit eBay Australia and spend a grand or more on an unlocked phone, but I choose not to.
It's all about choice. If you don't like iPhones, don't buy them. If you don't like AT&T, go get a Treo or Blackberry from somebody else. If you don't like iPhone articles, don't click on them. And for God's sake, don't comment unless you have something constructive.
[off topic] While on the subject of comments, what happened to our language? I can understand international readers losing something in translation, but there's really no excuse for poor grammar and bad spelling. Vulgarity and ALL CAPS do not work. It doesn't make you sound angry or loud, it makes you sound immature and uneducated. Phor whut itz wurth.
Best iPhone comment ever. Thank you!
You are definitely correct. I at least make sure the the majority of my spelling is correct (thanks to firefox). You just summarized up the whole issue with people, fanboys, and haters all in one comment. Nice Job.
I updated my phone forgetting that i had pwnaged it. all it did was just get rid of the pwnaged and went back to a iphone standard setting. oh well.
1.1.4 FTW fwahaha
To those complaining about the iPhone 3G being locked, Does it matter? Yeah unlock it and now you can use the iPhone on T-Mobile... oh yay! No Visual Voicemail and no 3G. WTF is the point...
The main reason at&t locked the device was not because of fear from regional carriers but fear of losing alot of the devices to people over sea. See the dollar is worth shit (thanks bush) and they would be able to buy the device cheaper here then in their home country... thats why its locked and requires activation instore.
Give it up apple. Trying to stop jail breaking is futile. You'll probably just end up like the PSP, in which case after years of trying, sony has basically just given up...
Every single firmware that apple has released has been jailbroken. So I would not put it past my mind if they do it again.
I got to say, there is some powerful people out there with hacking skills to break into firmwares and things and hack it. Way way way beyond what I certainly know.
Adderz, don't you get it? Us Americans DON'T want to spend $900 for an unlocked iPhone. We want it for $199.00 Unlocked with NO contract!! We are kind a wacky like that (expecting AT&T to pick up the remaining $500+ *** as he ex hails the bong dust ***)...
OK, pardon me for being ignorant/an idiot, but can I still downgrade back to 2.0.0 and have my jailbreak/future unlock?
thanks!
the only reason people are mad about the iphone not being unlocked or all in the news every five seconds is because they either a) dont have an iphone or b) they dont realize that the iphone is being sold by a company thats only reason for existing is to make money....its not for fun or to push the curve or any of that...its to make money as quikly and effeciently as possible and for as long as possible...thats it.
if they made it perfect the first time they would all sell out and everyone would have one yes but then that would be it....while if they make it just good enough to buy this time and then fix one or two things then we will all buy it again and then they fix a little more and then they sell out again and copy and paste over and over (pardon the choice of words there since the iphone doesnt copy and paste lol)
thats business and it makes loot......mo money mo money mo money
help here
After the update 2.0.1 on my computer (windows xp) was unable to download on m iphone says now you iphone is in recovry mode ,I hit restore error message appear what happen? help
Well, there's a shock.
ugh
so then i says to mable i says
Some people act like all phones aren't locked when you buy them from the Carrier. If you buy phones unlocked they are super expensive. I've had a lot of "smart" phones. The Sidekick, MDA lots of Blackberry's. All of them were locked. As far as Windows Mobile, I don't know about you guys, but my MDA sucked SO HARD. It was so slow and unstable. I mean sure it had a few options that the iPhone did not, but if it's slow and clunky who gives a crap right? Oh well I've been w/ Tmobile for 5 years. I'm on a Family plan w/ 4 iphones unlocked and t-zone hacked for $300 a month. ( unlimited every thing.) That same plan w/ AT&T would be almost $500 a month.
OUCH.
A few things NOT mentioned by the article which I feel should be pointed out:
- this has absolutely NO effect on the first-generation iPhone; not only have the DevTeam said that it is virtually impossible for Apple to ever permanently lock the 2G iPhone, but I have a Pwned phone now and was able to update to 2.0.1 with my phone remaining unlocked and activated.
- the 3G iPhone hasn't even been unlocked yet. I could see if this update changed the baseband and locked all the phones that had already been unlocked, but since no one has cracked the 3G iPhone yet, it doesn't really matter. It was locked before and it is still locked. I see this as a robber planing on robbing a bank. He's making his plans and then he finds out the bank put a second vault inside the first vault. This doesn't change anything, he still doesn't have any money, it just means it will take him a little longer to break in than he thought.
Upgraded to 2.01 - Broke the Jailbreak as expected, didn't break the unlock (although it was done through the vendor [and apple] for a fee - so I doubt any update will break it). Although the jailbreak created a huge instability in app-store downloaded programs, it would cause them to crash back to the home screen on startup.
@ Taylor
Apple has frequently updated the baseband with firmware upgrades. Its the BOOTLOADER they didn't touch. New basebands aren't new or antipwning specifically.
You guys have been really doing your homework but I'm surprised that none of you guys posted this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OUWtQHykeTI.
iPhone 3g remains unlocked even with the updated software of 2.0.1.
There guys are certainly not a bunch of sitting ducks.
calculate the total costs of a AT&T 24 month plan and you see that this is a rip-off.
Luckily hardware unlock is now super cheap and easy. And not illegal as you are not modifying the iPhone itself. Just slide in the Universal Sim card adapter together with your sim card and the iPhone is instantly unlocked. check the video footage showing how quick it is to unlock a Vodafone card and that it can also unlock 3G functions. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GbD-92cta-M
I bought the iPhone 2g. I got it un-locked with iDemocracy than I accidentally upgraded to 2.0.1. So, I paid $40 and got it un-locked. From iPhone infused. on there website they said it now un-locks 2.0 iPhone. Than they send me an e-mail that states, "it only works for MAC!"
I sent them a nasty e-mail. Don't use iPhone infused!