help with setting up a used iPhone 3g iOS 4.2.1

5 posts / 0 new
Last post
MaxTek's picture
Offline
Last seen: 1 year 5 months ago
Joined: Dec 20 2003 - 10:38
Posts: 702
help with setting up a used iPhone 3g iOS 4.2.1

I was given a near mint iPhone 3G in the box when a friend upgraded to the iPhone 4S. She went to AT&T and they copied over her settings etc to the 4S and now the 3G says 'no service". I put in my AT&T sim card from my old flip phone and turned off data in the phones settings, tested it and it makes calls and receives calls.

My questions is: what is the proper procedure for this. I DO NOT want edge/3g data. I just want an iPod touch (with wifi) that MAKES calls. I don't care about any messaging of any kind. The phone still has my friends stuff on it. Can I restore it in iTunes and put on my apps etc, or will that kill the activation? Should I use unlockit.co.nz and change the carrier settings. Does it need to be jailbroken?

Thanks

Dr. Webster's picture
Offline
Last seen: 14 hours 14 min ago
Joined: Dec 19 2003 - 17:34
Posts: 1747
Re: help with setting up a used iPhone 3g iOS 4.2.1

No need to unlock or jailbreak, since you're already on AT&T. You'd only need to do that if you wanted to stick, say, a T-Mobile SIM in there.

AFAIK you shouldn't be able to receive data service if you don't subscribe to a data plan, so you should be safe to just leave all of the settings on. If you're paranoid, or find that for some reason you're able to use data services over the cellular network, you can turn off just cellular data (not voice calls) in Settings --> General --> Network.

You should have no problems doing a restore of the phone in iTunes.

MaxTek's picture
Offline
Last seen: 1 year 5 months ago
Joined: Dec 20 2003 - 10:38
Posts: 702
Re: help with setting up a used iPhone 3g iOS 4.2.1

I have read things on other forums that people were charged for data because At&t found out they were using an iPhone from the IMEI number. Do you think this is true? Can they find out just from making a phone call?

Thanks for your reply.
Maxtek

Dr. Webster's picture
Offline
Last seen: 14 hours 14 min ago
Joined: Dec 19 2003 - 17:34
Posts: 1747
Re: help with setting up a used iPhone 3g iOS 4.2.1

My understanding is that they'll sign you up for a data plan if you are somehow able to use cellular data on an iPhone without paying for it (or paying for the proper plan). They'd be hard-pressed to justify charging a customer for a service just because the customer has the capability of using it, without actually doing so.

Technically, yes, AT&T could audit their logs and trace a phone call back to an IMEI, look up that IMEI and determine that it's an iPhone, then correlate that to the hardware that's associated with your billing account.

speedyG's picture
Offline
Last seen: 4 years 10 months ago
Joined: Nov 16 2011 - 07:45
Posts: 2493
Re: help with setting up a used iPhone 3g iOS 4.2.1

Up to this point the explanations so far so good.... but one thing is to be mentioned:
the problem with an open Wifi....
and the use of bluetooth...
you might set up the phone to not use data services - but if bluetooth is still active...
the phone might be hacked and the hacker might set the dataservice back to be "on" and he/she might then use your phone as a port...
the phone should be set up with secure network settings that only permit access by mac-control....
this is the only safe protection that really works by filtering the unique hardcodded mac-numbers of network-devices...
that makes access from other unwanted network devices impossible....

Log in or register to post comments