Rogers Canada forces Android update that takes away root access

Cory Doctorow 10:10 pm Tue Jan 26, 2010

Rogers, Canada's only carrier with Android handsets, has cut off data to customers until they run a mandatory firmware update. Nominally, this fixes a 911 bug: but it also prevents you from jailbreaking your phone and activating features and applications Rogers doesn't like (even if you paid full price for your phone).

But Rogers is only doing something about it now — namely, cutting data access of paying customers until they accept a mandatory firmware upgrade that not only fixes the 911 problem, but also contains 'extra' features that prevent users from ever gaining root access to their phones — even non-subsidized ones. And some phones are also getting bricked by this 'official' update. The moral: we really need to open up the competition here up North."

Canadian Android Carrier Forcing Firmware

(via /.)

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