This could get interesting pretty quickly. It’s common knowledge that T-Mobile Germany has been legally forced to sell an unlocked version of the previously locked iPhone. What hasn’t been clear until now, however, is just how the 999 Euro handsets will be freed from their SIM-locked shackles. Thankfully, the fog has lifted. Anyone trying to purchase an unlocked iPhone is given a regular “locked handset from the retailer. The IMEI of that phone is sent to Apple, who subsequently approves your handset for remote unlocking. Within 24 hours, you’ll get an email from Apple giving you the thumbs up. You then connect your handset to iTunes, and the software does the rest. Minutes later, you’ll have a fully unlocked iPhone running firmware version 1.1.2. Does this mean that iTunes has a built-in unlocking feature? Well, yes, but whether or not that feature is dependent upon Apple’s activation magic is unclear…we suppose the iPhone Dev Team is hard at work again.
German iPhones unlocked by way of iTunes
Updated Dec 19th, 2018 5:55PM EST
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Josh Karp followed his love of technology since a kid through to the present day. As a Special Correspondent at BGR, and part of the first editorial team, Josh covers press conferences, trade shows and other events around the world. An expert in all things mobile, Josh has more than eighteen years of experience covering the wireless industry.
