Is Verizon Breaking FCC Regulations With Locked Bootloaders?

First time accepted submitter PcItalian writes with an excerpt from an interesting editorial on XDA Developers: "The open access provision requires Verizon to 'not deny, limit, or restrict the ability of their customers to use the devices and applications of their choice on the licensee's C Block network.' It goes on to say, 'The potential for excessive bandwidth demand alone shall not constitute grounds for denying, limiting or restricting access to the network.' Verizon bought Block C and tried to have the provisions removed. They failed. ... That means if a device uses the Block C frequencies, Verizon cannot insist what apps or firmware it runs. ... So the question is, do any devices use Block C frequencies? Yes. Some are called Hotspots. Others are called the HTC Thunderbolt... [Hotspots] comply with FCC regulations as far as I'm aware. The HTC Thunderbolt, on the other hand, does not. In the list of rules and exceptions for the Block C license, it says this: 'Handset locking prohibited. No licensee may disable features on handsets it provides to customers, to the extent such features are compliant with the licensee's standards pursuant to paragraph (b) of this section'...'"

Oh really?

[JRowe47]

Like Verizon would let a silly little thing like laws get in their way...

Re:Great

[Anonymous Coward]

No... you go to the FCC and let them know, and they fine Verizon... and then Verizon raises its rates to cover the losses and then.... fuck.

An old slogan, paraphrased.

[sethstorm]

Verizon: we keep working you like a whore.

Re:The cycle continues

[Lehk228]

the way to stop this kind of BS is to make as a statutory penalty when a company is found violating any Law or FCC or FTC rule all customers have the option to cancel their contract with no fee or requirement to return a handset.

Why would we talk about suing?

[chaboud]

Non-compliance by Verizon is cause for the FCC's termination of Verizon's licenses of C-Block bands. At that point, the FCC should reclaim the licenses and re-auction them to parties who would know that they can sub-lease them to a Verizon that they have by the balls.

The move here is to petition the executive branch to actually do its fucking job, which may mean firing the entire Genachowski FCC and starting over.

Installing a new OS on my Windows machine doesn't void the warranty, and neither should installing a new build of Android on an Android device. There should be a golden bootloader that is locked that then allows the installation of any operating system software. Then you can make a relatively unbrickable device that gives people complete choice. TPM for the DRM dicks if you really think you have to, bud I'd rather that we, as a people, decide to stop stabbing ourselves in the face.

Verizon shouldn't be allowed any end-runs, nor should, frankly, anyone else. So the FCC didn't man up and actually give us network and device neutrality that makes sense. That's not the end of the world if they actually enforce C-Block restrictions effectively.

Violate license...lose it

[Roger W Moore]

No, the way to fix this is to seize all profits made as a result of the violation, and then add a fine on top of that.

The 'fine' should be loss of the license. They appear to have broken the license deliberately to make more money so they should have to repay the money and then lose the license for having proven themselves untrustworthy to have it. This would certainly be disruptive to customers but if governments behaved this way you'd soon see companies taking their responsibilities a lot more seriously and there there would be less need for such forceful action.

Re:The cycle continues

[larry bagina]

"Nigger" doesn't necessarily refer to a black person. There are plenty of white niggers, for example. There may even be some asian niggers. And there's definitely a lot of mexican niggers. In a few years, there will probably be more mexican niggers than black niggers.