Will XDA help overcome government kill switch

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jcnbama

Senior Member
Jun 4, 2012
948
180
Huntsville
Here in the good ole US of A Congress has passed a new law implementing a regulation that will require cell phone manufacturers to ship phones with a kill switch. Articles like this pursue... http://www.offthegridnews.com/2014/...-police-to-shut-off-all-cell-phones-remotely/

I wonder if the devs here at XDA will develop ways to hack the kill switch so that if a citizen doesn't want our phones at the control of law enforcement or the government whims then we can kill the kill switch. Hope so. I understand the general idea of it. But it does lend itself to the possibility of corruption and conspiracies. Maybe I don't want a kill switch...

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Archer

Inactive Recognized Developer / Retired Senior Mod
Jul 9, 2008
14,002
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Manchester
Google Pixel 8 Pro
Firstly, it's a state law so it's not applicable anywhere else in the US. Yes, that could change in the future but it could also be repealed so let's stick to the current facts.

Secondly, the bill itself states this...

Senate Bill 962 said:
Consumers should have the option to affirmatively elect to disable this protection, but it must be clear to the consumer that the function the consumer is electing to disable is intended to prevent the unauthorized use of the device.

This means that you can simply click "I don't want that" and it won't be enabled.

Informed choice is informed choice. The number of people who decide against having it enabled on their phone will definitely outweigh the number of people that would come here looking for a technical solution. Also, there would be no "fix" on here since all they'd have to do is hard reset their phone and go through the setup again.
 

jcnbama

Senior Member
Jun 4, 2012
948
180
Huntsville
Firstly, it's a state law so it's not applicable anywhere else in the US. Yes, that could change in the future but it could also be repealed so let's stick to the current facts.

Secondly, the bill itself states this...



This means that you can simply click "I don't want that" and it won't be enabled.

Informed choice is informed choice. The number of people who decide against having it enabled on their phone will definitely outweigh the number of people that would come here looking for a technical solution. Also, there would be no "fix" on here since all they'd have to do is hard reset their phone and go through the setup again.

This is true... For now. Things in the U.S. Are getting increasingly more over controlled by the government. I wouldn't be surprised if at some point it wasn't optional and it is just pushed as "being for our own good" the government thinks that we can't make decisions for ourselves. Just wondered if anyone else thought of that. If enough people opt out either:
A. The government will do away with the requirements
B. The government will decide that people obviously aren't informed enough to make decisions by themselves so they will make it mandatory.

Time will tell...

Sent from my LG-D801 using XDA Free mobile app
 

domini99

Senior Member
Jan 9, 2012
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Maasbracht
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So I've been googling quite a while, but can someone please tell me wut da hail this killswitch thing is?

I understood its something that puts the phone into an unusable state if it gets stolen..

Anything else?
 

TheArc

Inactive Recognized Themer
Jan 1, 2012
2,512
2,122
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Auckland
No offense but USA focuses on crazy laws when they could use the time to actually focus on causes that matter.

Again, the freedom of USA is at cost. I'm so happy I live in NZ.

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Perhaps the US should focus their time and money on putting this killswitch in their military hardware, first.... (If you don't know why, the Russians in east Ukraine have recently managed to acquire 3 battalions worth of heavy duty US-army hardware by means of occupation... Wouldn't it have been nice to have had that killswitch there..)

I'm fully against the government meddling in human stupidity. If people are dumb enough to leave their bags open, leave their phones on tables and leave them half-sticking out of their pockets, that is their own fault and they should deal with the consequences of their negligence by themselves. As opposed to bothering the rest of us with their stupidity.
 

ironman38102

Senior Member
Sep 9, 2012
3,413
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Manama
OnePlus 7T
No offense but I always thought the American government is crazy starting with the illegal sim unlocking. I've heard this kill switch before but didn't know what it does or what it is for. I'm glad this crazy thing doesn't apply here.