While in the early days of the iPhone, software unlocking was quite popular, permanent factory unlocks took them over in popularity due to the unavailability of a software unlock for newer iPhones.
It appears that AT&T is now making it quite difficult for third-party unlock sellers to unlock iPhones in bulk.
From The Wall Street Journal:
Wholesalers had long been able to get AT&T’s iPhones unlocked on a mass scale by specialized services, many working out of Asia, for relatively little cost. That changed about a month ago, when people in the industry say AT&T suddenly made it harder to unlock phones on its network.
“AT&T was very lax for a long time in regards to mobile phone unlocking. If they said no, a third-party unlocker would be happy to unlock any AT&T iPhone or other device for a very decent price,” said Will Strafach, who runs a Connecticut-based unlocking company called ChronicUnlocks. “AT&T is really taking action and coming down hard.”
While the reason for this block isn’t known, WSJ speculates that it could be because of the carrier’s stricter requirements to process unlock requests from customers who had off-contract iPhones. AT&T earlier took requests to unlock iPhones over the phone, but now it mandates the online method, where only current and former AT&T customers are eligible, who are required to enter their email and last four digits of their social security numbers. This suggests that AT&T has automated the process, keeping human intervention to the minimum, which could have earlier been the source of the unofficial unlocks.
This block on bulk unlocks has hit the iPhone resale industry very hard, with the prices of old iPhones going down significantly in the market. One business owner, who dealt in reselling used iPhones in China, had to shut down shop, which was otherwise on track to do a revenue of a million dollars in a year.
It is still possible to unlock an AT&T iPhone, but the cost of this is significantly higher at $100 compared to the $1 or $2 earlier.
If you were trying to get your iPhone factory unlocked using the “unofficial” channels, let us know how it went.
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