A British firm’s plan to sell software that could open the iPhone to non-US networks has been put on hold following legal threats.

Last week, Belfast-based UniquePhones joined several others in claiming it had cracked the code which locked iPhone into AT&T’s network.

But a middle-of-the-night phone call from AT&T’s lawyers have forced the firm to rethink its plans.

It will now take legal advice to assess the ramifications, the firm said.

According to UniquePhones, it received a 3am call from a lawyer claiming to represent AT&T and warning it that selling unlocking software could constitute copyright infringement and illegal software dissemination.

“A substantial delay caused by any legal action would render the unlocking software a less valuable commodity as well as creating unforeseen security issues for the company,” UniquePhones said in a statement.

Apple response

Interest in the iPhone, Apple’s first foray into the mobile world, has been intense since it was launched in the US in June.

On Friday it was reported that a 17-year-old US hacker had unlocked the iPhone and used it on rival T-Mobile’s network.

George Hotz said that the method he used took two hours and involved both tinkering with the software and some soldering.

A website called iPhonesSimFree also claimed to have cracked the code with a software solution that it would begin selling imminently.

Analysts believe Apple may still have time to modify the iPhone to tighten its locks before the phone is launched in Europe.

Any reported cracks would have ramifications for Apple’s European partners which, it is rumoured, the firm may announce at IFA 2007, a consumer electronics show being held in Berlin next week.

Tech blog Engadget thinks UniquePhone’s should make their unlocking solution available to the public.

“Here’s to hoping that, should UniquePhones not find themselves able to actually sell their software, at very least the unlock method they’ve discovered gets opened up to the public. After all, there’s no reason why everyone shouldn’t be able benefit from this knowledge just because one company isn’t able to sell it,” it said in a blog entry.

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We found LG’s “booth” slightly less impressive than Samsung’s, primarily due to the lack of a balcony cafe, which is just a serious oversight at this year’s IFA — all the cool Korean electronics giants are doing it. That said, LG is pretty serious about design these days, and has a lot of sexy product to prove it. Again, we’ll be getting you hands-on shots of the new releases later today, but for now you’ll have to settle for a stroll through hall 11.2 with us at the helm.

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Office Depot Featured Gadget: Xbox 360 Platinum System Packs the power to bring games to life!

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The internet should not be used as a scapegoat for society’s ills, said Vint Cerf, Google’s net evangelist and a founding father of the network.

Speaking on the BBC Radio 4’s Today programme he rejected calls for strict control of what is put online.

He said the net was just a reflection of the society in which we live.

Anyone regulating beyond what was clearly illegal put themselves on a “slippery slope” that could limit freedom of expression, he said.

“If it’s not illegal, it raises a rather interesting question about where you do draw the line,” he said.

Mirror image

Mr Cerf’s comments come after the UK’s Conservative Party floated ideas to curb the access young people have to sites such as YouTube which let them see videos showing extreme or callous violence.

Rather than impose controls centrally, said Mr Cerf, it was far better to put them at the edges of the network where users go online.

For instance, said Mr Cerf, searching for results via Google can be constrained by filters that can be set to be strict or lax.

It was a mistake, said Mr Cerf, to divorce what was seen online from what happens in the real world.

“Most of the content on the network is contributed by the users of the internet,” he said. “So what we’re seeing on the net is a reflection of the society we live in.”

“Maybe it is important for us to look at that society and try to do something about what’s happening, what we are seeing

He added: “When you have a problem in the mirror you do not fix the mirror, you fix that which is reflected in the mirror.

“We have a job to do, collectively as a society, to deal with the problems we discover in the network,” said Mr Cerf, “but suppressing the knowledge of what’s going isn’t going to help us.

“We need to face that problem directly.”

Google has a policy of removing video content when it has been flagged as offensive by users. But the company has been criticised for not acting swiftly enough.

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