India's Airtel claims "deadliest hackers" still can't crack its iPhone 3G

Hey, hackers! Now that we've got the attention of millions upon millions of incredibly talented individuals, here's your next challenge. India's Airtel -- which is offering Apple's iPhone 3G at a near-stratospheric price -- has claimed that "even the most deadly hackers on the planet won't be able to crack the codes that support the iPhone's Airtel applications with rival company SIMs." Just so you know, it appears that Airtel worked with Apple to develop "operator-specific iPhone applications," which is an interesting tidbit in and of itself. But let's focus on the task at hand here, and that's proving that making ridiculous claims about impenetrability always comes back to bite ya.

[Image courtesy of Zedomax, thanks Akshay]

[Seanross @ Aug 23rd 2008 7:52AM]

Since when are hackers deadly???

O I get it, they've been watching Live Free or Die Hard...

[zomg0t @ Aug 23rd 2008 8:03AM]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DNO6G4ApJQY
Serious Business

Anyway, I don't think the attention Airtel will get from claiming to be so secure and then from being hacked is worth getting hacked...

[▀█▀ █ ▀█▀ ▄█▀ @ Aug 23rd 2008 9:35AM]

everybody knows hacking is MURDER

[Viru @ Aug 23rd 2008 10:54AM]

Hackers are not deadly, instead the cost of iPhone 3G in India is definitely the deadliest, costing 800 US $ for a silly phone which has connnectivity slower than a 54kbps dial up modem, I think the Dial Up modem will be faster than the speeds airtel or other operators have to offer for internet browsing on GSM or CDMA network, by the way the fastest known connection for these GSM operators is EDGE which has variable speed depending on the Volume of Users at the same time, God Bless the folks who fall for this marketing gimmick and seriously think of purchasing iPhone in India

[DABII @ Aug 23rd 2008 12:54PM]

That movie was so shit!

[Techie @ Aug 23rd 2008 12:43PM]

Nothing is impossible ;D

[Chirag @ Aug 23rd 2008 1:42PM]

Obviously the guy who handles Airtel PR has never heard of Pwnage tool. We here in India will have the last laugh (or so we hope). The insane price apart. The phone is still LOCKED to Airtel. Not too surprising, Airtel is quite thuggish in its dealings with its customers.

[hiimcliff @ Aug 23rd 2008 4:31PM]

u look like nick cannon

[Mark Anderson @ Aug 23rd 2008 3:13PM]

Killed for $1 or less? We do it for fuck all in Scotland.

[GaryZ @ Aug 23rd 2008 3:40PM]

Time to call in those hackers from Mars!

[david @ Aug 23rd 2008 7:57AM]

It would be funny if everythig would work with Turbo SIM or any other HW hack.

[bidur @ Aug 23rd 2008 8:05AM]

na .. i am sure after 1 month .. normal cranker will do that for 100 IC ..

belive me ..

india is country where people are killed just for 1 $ or less . ..
people will do anything to earn money.. and now hacking iphone is a new business ..

[Raheem @ Aug 23rd 2008 8:17AM]

Lol - just like any other country in the world. If you're speaking of a harder work ethic then yes it's true, but it's not really a money thing as is illustrated from the fact that they often work for very little, at home and abroad.

[lolism @ Aug 23rd 2008 9:22AM]

although I would like to know where you found this statistic about "people are killed just for 1 $ or less ... "

Sounds like a (Steve) Jobsean Statistical Underestimation to me. (1% affected by Mobile Me outage)

[Raheem @ Aug 23rd 2008 1:26PM]

Lol oh right I forgot, most people don't understand socio-economics.

[Raheem @ Aug 23rd 2008 3:07PM]

Low ranking only makes me more arrogant :P

[Ray @ Aug 23rd 2008 8:22AM]

Now i really want this phone to be hacked. When companies bate hackers like this, its hard to show mercy as a consumer. I'm not a heavy "warez" user, but skyrocketing prices and security over innovation are very good reasons to be.

[Snooze @ Aug 23rd 2008 8:31AM]

Still waiting for the unlock. What's taking them so long?

[Raheem @ Aug 23rd 2008 9:13AM]

Social lives.

[rahul @ Aug 23rd 2008 8:40AM]

dont mind us Indians.. these airtel guys are the worst sort of n00bs you can find on this planet. they've invited trouble by stating such a thing. i know for a fact that my friend is using its Airtel Live service for free since a year.

[rahul @ Aug 23rd 2008 8:51AM]

am voting you down for lying :P

[chickenator @ Aug 23rd 2008 8:57AM]

congrats!!!

[Ashvala @ Aug 24th 2008 1:11PM]

@rahul they just say it because we Indians bought ONLY 700(seven hundred) iPhone 3G's on the 1st day!

[John Smith @ Aug 23rd 2008 9:31AM]

1m 1n y0ur c0mput3r h4ck1ng y0ur f1l3s...

It was going to happen anyway, now it's going to happen quicker than ever.

[Tomheivers @ Aug 23rd 2008 9:36AM]

Why would you hack the Iphone if you could get it unlocked in Belgium?

[CUBSWILLWIN @ Aug 23rd 2008 9:49AM]

Because it cost's as much as 2 puppies and a lifetime supply of ham.

[airforcemonkey @ Aug 23rd 2008 9:37AM]

Seriously?

[agent_DK @ Aug 23rd 2008 9:49AM]

hey, being an indian lemme ask these airtel guys is this any way of ur strategy to make people buy iphone, atleast the hackers?????


cos nobody in india with little brains is gonna buy this fone from india......cos its damn costly.....700$ in India compared to 199$ in US without contract.......

what abt Steve Jobs speech??.......in the keynote he said the price will be similar to 199$ worldwide.....doesnt india belong to ur globe?????

[UnixSystemsEngineer @ Aug 23rd 2008 10:02AM]

ur typing iz hard 2read

[Jas @ Aug 23rd 2008 10:07AM]

Since when is it without contract for $200 in US?

[Jas @ Aug 23rd 2008 10:09AM]

Since when is it $200 without contract in US?

[Shamasis @ Aug 23rd 2008 5:00PM]

Arre... what he meant was its without contract in india.
$799 fro locked phone without contract.... this is absurd.

I guess this will push sales for HTC touch, HTC diamond, Samsung Omnia, Samsung Instinct, SE W960i, etc etc

[CUBSWILLWIN @ Aug 23rd 2008 9:47AM]

They do have toilet paper. They also have the toilets that spray your arse...

[Baughb @ Aug 23rd 2008 9:47AM]

Guess who I'm rooting for? :)

[CUBSWILLWIN @ Aug 23rd 2008 9:49AM]

I think my answer is wrong... ;)

[gonintendo @ Aug 23rd 2008 10:03AM]

I'll give them a week til they hack it.

[avis @ Aug 23rd 2008 10:09AM]

hey this is another kinda hype like iPhone 3G is twice faster than ..errr.. 2G!

[John @ Aug 23rd 2008 10:34AM]

I think you mean 1.5G

[avis @ Aug 24th 2008 12:08AM]

you got me!..

[Shoumik @ Aug 23rd 2008 10:09AM]

uhhh it depends on where you are. Most houses in major cities like Kolkata, Madras, and New Delhi have it, but some of the more old-fashonied mug and bucket types are still out there. But hey when I lived in India 8 years ago, I never even knew wat toilet paper was, Now i'm living in the us and just visited india and toilet paper is used widely. It's also available in most department store, but not like the kind u get in the states. After spending a month in india, i treated myself to some charmin!

[ma5t3rw1tt @ Aug 23rd 2008 10:16AM]

I have to bow before these hackers who made Jailbreak & Unlocking what it is. It was because of them that I went out and got a iPod Touch. When all other iPods came out, I found nothing really useful of them to really care about buying one. Sure, everyone that I knew had one, showing off the Apple device, but I was like whatever. Just another MP3 on the market.

However, when the iPod Touch came out and when I learned on what kinds of things it could do, exspecially browsing the internet and running games and applications, I was sold. That was something I knew would keep me entertained and informed off all the things I wanted.

It is going to be funny as shit when someone does crack the 3G and unlock it. I bet everyone and their brother would be shitting their pants. All this goes way past my knowledge of code & everything.

[JAX @ Aug 23rd 2008 10:24AM]

its just their marketing tatics...The iphone sales increases if it gets hacked...Wish someone hacks vodafone iphones and leave airtel unhackable...only a few will buy airtel iphone then...

[[e-mail] @ Aug 23rd 2008 10:26AM]

last time Airtel did this - the impenetrable hack was sim superglued into their phones

[motang @ Aug 23rd 2008 10:35AM]

AirTel...I though Vodafone was going to be carrying iPhone in India. Airtel has really good service, I was using them when I was in India few months ago.

[steven @ Aug 26th 2008 8:59PM]

if nobody can afford it, nobody can hack it

[sr @ Aug 23rd 2008 11:44AM]

Wow $800 for a LOCKED iPhone. Do they think people are stupid?

[x3qt0r @ Aug 24th 2008 3:25AM]

Yes.

[c @ Aug 23rd 2008 12:56PM]

I wish if anyone atleast read the article. Article states that if the "deadly hacker" used sim of the rival network and used voice call he wont be able to use "Airtel Live" ( which is a network dependent feature). So basically neither is the iPhone locked and neither they have implemented any super "Anti Hacker Technology" . But since its super expensive they wanted to be newsworthy and whats most news worthy nowadays than security and hackers ;) By saying how secure they are they are just promoting ...their uber expensive iPhone to PHBs .
Note: AirTel Live is not an iPhone specific application either its available on nokias and SE and any other gprs phone on Airtel network.

[Joe Anstine @ Aug 23rd 2008 1:00PM]

haha this is just like when Apple said no one could write a virus for a Mac...too bad back then no1 cared about writing viruses for Macs because no one who didn't have their head up their ass would store vital information on a Mac.

Someone will crack the iPhone 3G. And then Apple will scramble to issue a new update to make that hack null and void, rinse and repeat. If they don't, I will renounce my Apple prejudice and jump on the Apple wagon

[l_s @ Aug 23rd 2008 1:13PM]

Now that i have stopped laughing reading this absurd claim, the only two features that Airtel "claims" to be unpenetrable are Airtel Live and Airtel Apps. Anyone using Airtel will tell you that Airtel Live is just another portal...nothing "exclusive" out there. Believe me, u got better ways to access google search than through Live and Airtel Apps r nothing to write about. So there IS NO challenge since Airtel themselves admit that the phone can be competely manipulated except for these two features.