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US Copyright Office Recommends Permanent Ability to Unlock Cellphones

VICE Motherboard:

The United States Copyright Office recommended in a report released Thursday that you, me, and everyone in between should permanently have the right to unlock our cellphones, a recommendation that would represent a major win for consumers and their right to reuse older cellphones on the wireless networks of their choosing.

“If Congress wishes to provide more certainty to users,” the report reads, “the [Copyright] Office recommends the adoption of a permanent unlocking exemption.”

“These locks provided no real cybersecurity or anti-piracy benefits, and they ultimately only served to lock consumers into using a single telecom carrier,” Ferras Vinh, of the Center for Democracy and Technology, told Motherboard.

Full story here.