Starting today you can’t unlock a smartphone if you are still under contract. However you in most cases call whoever you have your contact with and they will unlock it for you. You just can’t do it on your on. The Digital Millennium Copyright Act had once let you get away with it but not anymore. Read below to find out what the law now says.
The Law:
Civil penalties are based on the carrier’s actual damages and any additional profits of the violator, or a court can award statutory damages of not less than $200 or more than $2,500 per individual act. Criminal penalties are even more severe: any person convicted of violating section 1201 willfully and for purposes of commercial advantage or private financial gain (1) shall be fined not more than $500,000 or imprisoned for not more than 5 years, or both, for the first offense; and (2) shall be fined not more than $1,000,000 or imprisoned for not more than 10 years, or both, for any subsequent offense.