Hacking the Iphone

28th August 2007

Thursday, August 23, 2007
A 17 year old kid named George Hotz, of New Jersey, successfully completes his summer project to hack (unlock) the iPhone, so that it can be run on any cellular service, not just AT&T.

He posted all 10 steps to his blog and by Friday,  made world and national news on all the stations.  The hack involves tinkering with the actual hardware, and is not merely a software hack, so most people will find this too difficult, but still,  a remarkable accomplishment.

Friday, August 24
George announces that he is going to sell the hacked phone on eBay on Saturday night, with the hopes of getting enough money to fix his car, which currently is missing the engine.  Later that day he updates his post to say that eBay is giving him a hard time about this, because there’s apparently some question as to the legality of his actions. in other words, AT& T it is ticked off because their monopoly may be over.

Later that same day, Engadget has announced  that they too have developed a successful hack For the iPhone,  this one a software hack that only takes a few seconds! The party seems to be over for AT&T

Saturday, August 25
EBay forces kid to end auction early, and kid says in his blog, “if you’re interested in buying this phone, E-mail me or comment here”.  Kid then promises to hand over the phone live on CNN to the winning bidder and receives 119 comments on his blog.

Later in the day, the winning bidder is announced,  and it turns out to be a trade, instead of an outright purchase.  Kid trades the hacked iPhone for a vehicle, (a Nissan 350 CE), and 3 brand new iPhones.

He announces his plan to unlock the three Iphones, and names who the the receivers of those three phones will be,  including one going to the person that donated the original iPhone for the project.

He also announces that he is “out of the iPhone project, and is departing for college on Sunday.  I ‘m sure this kid will have a brilliant career ahead of him…