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Revrunner01 Author

Level 1

0 points

How do I turn my iphone into something not useless?

Hi i'm starting to get very frustrated. I bought an iphone 5 off craiglist the other day and was not aware of the whole needing the other person to be signed out of the account for the phone not to be complete garbage business. I thought it would work fine after taking it home where I would have wifi and put my sim card into it to work. I had an Ipod several years ago and was just switching back to the iphone. Apperantly from google searching and youtube viewing my only option is heavy paper clip and something that involves DNS Bypass which only gives limited capabilities. I could barely afford this it was 150 dollars. I broke my other phone and now I am completly screwed. My only option that I can even think of is to sell it back on craigslist scamming someone else for useless heap of garabage. I don't want to do that however. Im a full time student with a part time job and this really hurt me. Does apple even care about people getting screwed over? Is there some way I can fix this? Is there some way I can sell it legitimately? Is there some way I can actually talk to someone in apple without paying 30 dollars? If nothing can be done then so be it i'll do what I have to do, but if apple actually reads anything, I want them to know I will forever consider them as satan if nothing can be done. Thanks for reading and any help!

iPhone 5

Posted on Mar 22, 2015 9:53 PM

19 replies

ChrisJ4203

Level 10

230,371 points

Mar 23, 2015 1:47 PM in response to Revrunner01

Revrunner01 wrote:

I just want others not to have to go through the same process I have.

Then posting here is not going to help. Activation Lock has been advertised. If you live in the US, you have to have seen enough information about cellular phone manufacturers being required to put kill switches (software) into their devices. San Francisco was a big advocate of this and was all over the news in the past. There are numerous other options to get inexpensive phones. Many carriers offer free phones with contract, even older iPhones.

Mar 23, 2015 1:52 PM in response to Revrunner01

Revrunner01 wrote:

I appreciate all the responses. However don't buy off craiglist and check before you buy (in my defense if it turns on and appears to be in good working condition I would assume it would work) along with things of that nature are not a solution to my problem. I need to know solutions that I can actually do with this phone.

There is NO SOLUTION unless the previous owner cooperates. And can you really say with a straight face that you didn't know that stolen or lost iPhones could not be used? It was first announced 2 years ago, with big fanfare that made every news outlet around the world. There have been followup articles regularly reporting how effective Activation Lock has been at reducing iPhone theft, one just a few weeks ago that made all major news outlets. A number of State legislatures have laws under consideration that would mandate this feature on all smart phones and other devices sold in the state (California is in the lead on this). Every major manufacturer has announced that they will be implementing equivalent features like Activation Lock.

But for it to work there must be no ways around it, or enterprising thieves could employ social engineering to get a manufacturer to unlock a phone that was protected with Activation Lock. Currently the only ways are to prove that you are the original owner who bought it from Apple directly or an authorized Apple iPhone retailer, or to prove that the owner is dead AND the deceased was the original owner.

Mar 23, 2015 2:18 PM in response to Lawrence Finch

Even when you know the owner, they coorporate and they think they know their apple ID - activating an iPhone is not possible.... its like a mystery to me.....

Mar 23, 2015 2:50 PM in response to swissyols

Wrong. The original owner can easily free Activation Lock on the phone. See: What to do before selling or giving away your iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch and Find My iPhone Activation Lock: Removing a device from a previous owner’s account.

How do I turn my iphone into something not useless?