Filed under: Hacks, iPhone, Jailbreak/pwnage
Blacksn0w unlocks iPhone OS 3.1.2 and baseband 05.11.07
What does this mean? The iPhone can be unlocked for any GSM carrier, allowing you to use it on more than your country's authorized carrier or other carriers as you're traveling abroad.
Geohot suggests that you update to a fresh copy of iPhone OS 3.1.2 directly from Apple before performing his unlock. He has all the instructions available on his site.
![TUAW [Cafepress]](http://www.blogsmithmedia.com/www.tuaw.com/media/tuaw-cafepress-promo.png)
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
mark said 3:09PM on 11-03-2009
And it works like a charm! I sacrificed an unlocked iPhone 3G to the 3.1.2 restore process and blackra1n/blacksn0w freed it.
Your Mac guide is here: http://www.hackthatphone.com/3x/b_3_1_2_3g.html
Thank you GeoHot!
Reply
urth said 3:23PM on 11-03-2009
***you cannot downgrade from 5.11 baseband!!**** please note, as usual, there is insufficient instructions and info about this(I was 19 once, communication is too much effort,like y'know), you still have to upgrade to official firmware 3.12 which means also upgrading baseband.
of course, this is awesome and it was not just geohot but collective effort this time.
Reply
Tired_ said 3:46PM on 11-03-2009
Any clues as to how this does the unlock? I only ask because GeoHot's last tool was released with some problems left, and I remember previous tools overwrote critical stuff that bricked phones when they were updated. Any chance of that here?
Reply
Josh Carr said 3:48PM on 11-03-2009
@Tired_
I don't think so. The iPhone Dev Team is supporting this hack. Check it out:
blog.iphone-dev.org
I would take that to mean that they've tested it and like it. I don't think they'd put up a post congratulating Geohot for his efforts without liking the work he did. ;)
Tired_ said 3:58PM on 11-03-2009
Dev Team wrote the original tool I was referring to. A simple shout-out doesn't really reassure me. If this exploit just modifies code in memory like the other recent exploits, it should be safe, but I'm not familiar with "the at+xemn crash". Got any technical info?
Yuusharo said 4:04PM on 11-03-2009
Its similar to ultrasn0w, in that its a simple daemon that runs in the background on your jailbroken iPhone. There are no additional modifications or flashing necessary, and it is 100% reversible.
This means, however, that 3G and 3GS owners need to be extremely careful when updating their iPhones. If you have a 3GS, register your device with saurik's servers, to preserve your ability to restore to 3.1/3.1.2, or even 3.0/3.0.1 if you hopped on the unlock train way back in July.
If you see an update from Apple, *DON'T DO IT!* It should go without saying at this point, but there are still tons and tons of posts from people claiming they "accidentally" upgraded.
Reply
Mark Abercrombie said 4:14PM on 11-03-2009
Black rain certainly unlocks an iPhone 3GS..... However, WiFi doesn't work after the unlock. I've spent all evening on this and decided to revert back to factory settings....... nice try though GeoHot. Keep at it.
Reply
Michael G said 4:21PM on 11-03-2009
WiFI works fine for me. You may need to reset your network settings in preferences. I didnt have to but my friend did, and he is working fine on TMobile.
Phil Mc said 5:04PM on 11-03-2009
Mark,
I was about to do the whole Blacksnow thing then saw that after you got past the jailbreak point and had the Blackrain icon then you needed to have an internet connection, my problem will be that i need to update to the new baseband through itunes which will lock my phone and remove all my wifi and cell data capability so where am i supposed to get the internet connection to run the unlock? any ideas
Jimbo said 12:22PM on 11-04-2009
How about tethering up to your laptop to get a connection?
Brian said 4:30PM on 11-03-2009
Very quick and easy, a job well done.
Reply
camkevbell said 4:40PM on 11-03-2009
I'd wait a couple weeks to let other people beta test this before jumping onboard. Why learn from your own mistakes when you can learn from others instead?
Reply
wase4711 said 7:06PM on 11-03-2009
this is the easiest jailbreak ever known to mankind..took about 30 seconds, and everything works fine on a 3gs..simply awesum...
Reply
michael Berba said 9:11PM on 11-03-2009
best jailbreak tool yet!
the better they get the less aprpehensive and the longer I keep them on my phone. Having to reboot with pwnage tool is a pain in the rear.
when you can do it in 3 mins and have it save all your current apps is AWESOME!!!
Reply
Caletz said 10:42PM on 11-03-2009
Thanks!!! geo youre the man!!!
Reply
Paul Solomon said 10:53PM on 11-03-2009
Thanks for explaining...
Reply
Mark Abercrombie said 2:34PM on 11-04-2009
Thanks Guys. Resetting the network settings did the trick. Now unlocked and loving it!
Reply
Crease said 3:06PM on 11-04-2009
I've unlocked my phone, but now my neither of my e-mail accounts will connect. they seem to be losing their password. Anyone know of a fix?
Reply
Jason said 5:52PM on 11-04-2009
I have my iphone unlocked to 3.0 on tmobile and am gonna update it to 3.1.2 do i have to have a wifi connection on my iphone for it to work or not.
thanks if any one knows
Reply
joesixgig said 2:53PM on 11-05-2009
Ran this on a 3G. Worked, apart from having sn0w get stuck on the 'log file' screen. After a forced restart the phone WAS carrier unlocked though. Since then I've gotten a case of cold feed. Who is to say that some of these nice Cydia apps don't stream all my locally saved passwords (online banking..) to a remote server, or all your contacts for nice spam lists, or your apple password?
Question: if you only carrier unlock, is there any clear knowledge on what new vulnerabilities you are open to after this process? Can people extract the source code and see if there are any backdoors etc? Maybe I'm not cut out for this unlocking biz after all! -Joe
Reply