Looks like they completely buried the lead. That is, US carriers use proprietary hardware/software devices to establish and maintain a profitable strangle-hold on the consumer. No doubt the law the broken. There's no justification for that. However, the lead is the lead is the lead, and it's burried.
It's "lede"...
AT&T employees were bribed to install phone unlocking malware on company network
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Re: AT&T employees were bribed to install phone unlocking malware on company network
#62How do you avoid charges that serious by "leaving" the company sounds like AT&T security is a bit wishy washy.
I would AT&T would have wanted to make an example some of them.
In the UK getting busted by the Plod / MET or the Security Service would have been preferable to the internal security.
Re: AT&T employees were bribed to install phone unlocking malware on company network
#63This person did nothing wrong. Laws holding people accountable for helping people who are being abused by an unaccountable power are themselves abusive and should be struck down.
Re: AT&T employees were bribed to install phone unlocking malware on company network
#64I wonder what the footprint is do the SIM hijacking, e.g. is anyone a sufficiently high enough bribe away from the type of scheme that compromises their account because it only takes 1 employee to effect it. I've been switching to hardware keys when I'm able but it's not always feasible. I just bought a Titan key combo and you can't use most 3rd party email clients with it so that made it kind of useless to me (since…
Fraudulent SIM swaps are already being done and it's a lot less sophisticated than this - just show up to a store with a fake ID (or bribe the low-wage employee who isn't paid enough to give a shit so I can't really blame them).
Your SMS based 2FA is only as secure as the lowest paid employee at a cell phone store.
Re: AT&T employees were bribed to install phone unlocking malware on company network
#65Looks like they completely buried the lead. That is, US carriers use proprietary hardware/software devices to establish and maintain a profitable strangle-hold on the consumer. No doubt the law the broken. There's no justification for that. However, the lead is the lead is the lead, and it's burried.
Is it really a stranglehold if it's a condition of a contract that consumers agree to in exchange for subsidized hardware?
Personally I would never buy a carrier-locked phone, but I have the resources available to make that choice. Though the difference is maybe not huge, how many people do you think are online directly because of a carrier subsidy?
Re: AT&T employees were bribed to install phone unlocking malware on company network
#66His methods were illegal but can we please recognize this guy for being an ABSOLUTE HERO for unlocking all those phones and giving the people what they wanted.
A contract was violated when these phones were unlocked. In return for a locked phone the buyer received a subsidy from AT&T on the cost of the hardware. I don't want people to violate contracts with me, why should I recognize someone as a hero just because I don't like the contract? To be absolutely clear, I don't like locked phones, either, so I always buy non-carrier-locked devices and it means I pay the full, uns…
What contract? Most of these contracts have terms for canceling early. Like a fee to cover the remaining cost of the phone. After that point, it's their phone and I don't see a problem with someone using their property on another network.
Re: AT&T employees were bribed to install phone unlocking malware on company network
#67Earlier quoted context omitted.
Many of these devices are unlocked in bulk and sold overseas. This deprives them of the payments that they expected for fronting the cost of the device.
I still don't understand how. Regardless of who ends up using the phone, surely the original purchaser/signer is still on the hook for the monthly payments? ie. If I buy a contract iPhone from AT&T then unlock and sell on the phone, that doesn't nullify the fact that I still owe AT&T $100 a month for 24 months, regardless of where the phone is?
If you buy an AT&T locked phone from a third party retailer, (ex Best Buy), you're expected to sign up for AT&T, but not under contract to do so; these phones are usually marketed for prepaid plans.
AT&T will usually unlock them if you request it prior to using it on their network, but would likely not unlock them in bulk for exporters.
I've purchased and used some of these when the price and timing was right and the frequencies aligned with my chosen network. It's more hassle than an unlocked phone, but sometimes the phone isn't available unlocked or locked to my chosen carrier. (More often, these phones are missing key frequencies, so not very useful on other networks)
Re: AT&T employees were bribed to install phone unlocking malware on company network
#68malware is defined as software that will cause damage. This doesn't appear to have caused any damage to the owner's phone.
Re: AT&T employees were bribed to install phone unlocking malware on company network
#69I think it's very important to note the long-term crappy treatment of AT&T employees by management - most recently illustrated by the wholesale transfer of thousands of senior IT people to IBM (an even worse employer, doubtlessly for off-the-AT&T books elimination).
A good employer, and most are better than AT&T, has a certain level of loyalty as a defense. This bribe thing doesn't surprise me one tiny bit.
Re: AT&T employees were bribed to install phone unlocking malware on company network
#70ATT support is awful. I recently had to contact support and through chat support the person said they were adding notes to my account. Of course when I call support another day they have no record of this. They then proceed to forward my call to 2 other departments each of which has no idea why I'm calling. I talked to each of these people for several minutes. How can a company possibly function like this?
Same with Comcast, if not worse. For some reason their systems appear to take forever to load a customer account. One could probably find and pull a physical file of a user account faster in the pre-computer days out of a huge room full of wall to wall filing cabinets. I am not sure if it's ineptness or they pretend to take long to make support calls as frustrating as possible.
The trick I've found with Comcast is to go to their offices. The in-person support people have always been able to deal with whatever I was there for quickly and satisfactorily.