The Pentalobe: Apple's screwy attempt to keep iPhone 4 locked won't work

Jan. 21, 2011 - PRLog -- Many many years ago, back when Cable TV was still young, a friend of mine who liked to tinker with electronics (we’d call him a hacker today) figured out a way to get inside the cable box and unlock access to premium channels like HBO and Showtime.

But it wasn’t long until the cable companies got wise to what he - and certainly many others - were doing to these boxes. And so, they came up with a way to keep people from getting to the inner components of those boxes - they replaced one of the four standard screws that held the box together with a special screw, one that had a special head that needed a special screwdriver that only their employees had.

Yeah, like that was going to stop anyone. It wasn’t long until the guys in shop class busted out some scrap metal and some welding equipment and created a screwdriver that would twist that special little screw right out.

I remembered that guy and his special little screwdriver this morning when I read about how Apple - in its effort to keep people from poking around inside their iPhone 4s - has started replacing standard screws with a special screw that has a flower-shaped slot on the head. (It’s called a Pentalobe.)
It’s funny that Apple would go to such extremes to keep people locked out of a device that actually belongs to the consumer. Certainly, my friend from high school could have gotten himself into some deep trouble for tampering with a product that didn’t belong to him. Cable boxes tend to remain the property of the cable company and are just leased, for a monthly fee, to the customer.

Once Apple sells an iPhone to a consumer, that consumer owns it and should be free to do whatever he wants to it, right? Sure, he could void the warranty on it for tampering with it - and that’s a risk that that consumer takes when he opens it. And certainly, if he does something to alter the software, there’s probably some sort of violation of the licensing agreement.
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http://www.bestlaptopbattery.co.uk/toshiba/pa3534u-1brs.htm
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