i did not see the message your iphone unlocked after i did backup and restore after at&t confirmed my unlocking. pl. suggest.

Me have this problem too, cannot solved, no idea what to do right now. Even as email confirmed from AT&T below:

Dear Customer:

Thank you for your recent inquiry regarding your AT&T service. We apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you. The issue has been resolved.

Should you have any further needs regarding this issue, please do not hesitate to call us at 1 800 331-0500 and reference the tracking number shown above.

Sincerely,

AT&T

If you rphone was ever jailbroken it cannot be unlocked by a carrier. I don't know if this is your problem or not, but you would know.

Congrats Kranti.

Tried in the same way Kiran Bhai.Really frustrated 😟

Hi Kranthi,

Great help from your research.

I did followed these steps but I am nit getting unlocked message and my iphone is asking for activation now.

Could you please let me know if you had an active AT&T sim card during the backup and restore process?

Thanks again for your help.

I had the same issue. I followed AT&T's instructions several times and never saw the message. Then I reset the phone from the phone itself (complete reset and erase). As soon as it started, Itunes gave me the "magical" message. I had two phones and I didn't see the message with any one initially. One is all set now and I will try the next one after I finish setting up this one.

Here is what I did:

1-Connect the phone with iTunes using the sync cable.

2-Backup the phone

3-Disconnect the phone from iTunes

4-On the Phone, try Settings->General->Reset-> Erase All Content and Settings

5-Turn off the phone

6-Reconnect with iTunes using the sync cable (the phone is still OFF)

7-Turn ON the Phone. When the phone turns on, iTunes says "Congragulations, your iPhone has been unlocked"

Tried this on two iPhone 4's and they both showed the message.

Good Luck to all !!!

Tried this way too Ayyildiz.no use 😟

Jip,

I would give it another try. Two iPhone's with different iOS versions were sucessfully unlocked. I had the same issues in the beginning.

The apple instructions regarding the install are not totally clear. I had the same problem with never getting the "congratulations your phone has been unlocked message" and the problem was with the type of restore I was doing. At&t tech support told me the problem: You need to do a full factory restore using the restore button in iTunes, not the right click "restore from backup" method. I have a 3GS, ios 5.1.1, iTunes 10.6.1.7. The steps from At&t should read: perform backup, do full factory restore in iTunes, receive unlock congratulation, then restore from backup to get your settings back. Hope this helps someone.

You are right; the AT&T instructions are not clear. You must use the Restore button, not the Restore from Backup. good post!

THIS WORKED!

Here's my solution:

I did get the email from AT&T in no time after speaking to their tech support.

I did a mistake of backing up and restoring several times using right click at the phone icon in the menu on the left side. This just restores the settings.

I then realized that I need to restore using the button under the Summary tab -> Version section.

This downloads the latest iOS software and updates the firmware.

Even after this happened, I got no screen stating that my phone was unlocked.

I was disappointed and tried another trick, which FINALLY WORKED:

I took the SIM card out and did the same RESTORE.

This time it went till a point and then said I need to insert SIM to activate the phone.

I reinserted the AT&T SIM and then VOILA! got the popup message saying Congrats - iphone is unlocked etc...

Then it asked me if I wanted to restore from backup or just creat a new iPhone. I chose restore from backup.

It also asked me to register the iPhone all over again...

BTW, in the middle of all these, when I contacted Apple, they were quite curt and not helpful. Some of them claim to be "geniuses" to just boost their own egoes. They are actually quite clueless.

What truly happens is that AT&T sends a code to Apple servers saying that the iPhone can be unlocked. For your phone to actually become unlocked, the Apple servers need to be pinged. That happens only with the Restore button located under Summary -> Version tab. And of course, what happens after that seems to be a bit erratic... removing the SIM did the trick for me...

Hope this helps someone at least...

OK, glad it's resolved. You didn't have to remove the SIM, however. If you do a version update that will not unlock the phone. So the 2nd restore just restored 5.1.1 and would have activated the phone whether you removed the SIM or not.

I understand, but when I tried the proper restore the first time with the SIM in, the phone just got activated automatically without the popup screen or giving me options how to restore.

Only when I removed the SIM on my second try of the proper restore, it wouldn't go forward unless I reinserted the SIM back to ACTIVATE the phone. This time it showed the message.

It is possible that the phone remains unlocked as Kranti Kiran experienced. For the message to show, one might need to physically activate the phone. It is this process that is not straightforward and has caused the need for people to look for solutions in this forum...