Verizon to stop automatic unlocking of phones as FCC ends 60-day unlock rule

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2026/01/fcc-lets-verizon-lock-phones-for-longer-making-it-harder-to-switch-carriers/

19 Comments

  1. Wow that fucking sucks! Especially if you just buy phone from Apple full price. Only buying unlocked now even though they charge extra $30 for unlocked if you are buying non Pro model.

  2. HistorianGlass442 on

    What is the point of having something done just to turn around and change it?

    You buy a phone, pay for it and it should be yours to do what you want with it. If you are still paying it off then I can understand, but not if you have paid outright.

  3. Appropriate_Host4170 on

    Boy good thing we picked a child rapist and his anti-consumer Republican minions over a woman who laughed funny and wouldn’t give 2 word kindergarten answers on topics that required measured responses to. 

  4. Enshitification continues. The government and corporations are conspiring to make it so that you own nothing.

    People can fight back by buying only fully unlocked phones and prepaid plans. You’ll probably save money doing so also.

  5. They literally do nothing—not a single thing—to help regular people.

    Even the stuff that’s not nakedly fascist is literally never good news.

    Why is every single fucking headline during the Trump era about another commonsense good idea they’re demolishing so the rich can get richer?

    Every single day is a new low, because there are still thousands of laws, consumer protections, and programs meant to help people that they can destroy—and every single day, they destroy another one.

    Fuck every Trump voter until the end of time, you horrible, horrible people.

  6. Party-Cake5173 on

    Wait… in the US, phones are still locked to the carrier? Here in the EU that practice stopped more than a decade ago.

  7. Use Visible service and I buy my pixels from Google at 0% interest. You select which network, or none, when you buy it.

  8. Uncle_Hephaestus on

    Don’t worry everyone it definitely better for you if you are infinitely locked into a single company. /s

  9. Also reminder that Verizon often permanently bootloader-locks phones they sell in addition to very aggressive SIM-locking policies described here.

  10. Chunky_Queef_Stew on

    I literally bought a tracphone and three months of service the other day, it hasn’t even come in the mail yet. With plans of getting it unlocked so I can put my lifeline sim in it. I guess that money just got wasted, and I don’t just have money to waste, so that’s cool

  11. Chunky_Queef_Stew on

    I literally bought a tracphone and three months of service the other day, it hasn’t even come in the mail yet. With plans of getting it unlocked so I can put my lifeline sim in it. I guess that money just got wasted, and I don’t just have money to waste, so that’s cool

  12. Another win for the citizens of the US! Soon, we’ll finally get around to helping out those renters who think it’s OK to move when their landlord is a dick.