Credit @munibren

Jailbreaking is more than just freeing yourself from the limitations put forth by AT&T and Apple. It’s about taking control of your phone and installing the software that you want on your phone. Jailbreaking is not for everyone. Not everyone has the patience and technical knowledge to deal with jailbreak solutions out there. And considering that Apple and AT&T are out to punish jailbreakers, you may face some adversity if you do decide to jailbreak your phone. If you have decided to jailbreak your phone, your biggest challenge won’t come from Apple or AT&T. It will be from hackers and crackers that can’t wait to get their hands on your sensitive information.

Jailbreak phones have become a sweet target for hackers around the world. In the past few weeks, we have heard about a few serious attacks on these phones. The latest worm that is attacking jailbroken phones is going after user’s personal data. It installs itself on iPhones and transmits the owners’ personal data to a server in a foreign country. If previous worms have not gotten your attention yet, this should. Here is what Intego had to say about this new worm:

When active on an iPhone, the iBotnet worm changes the root password for the device (from “alpine” to “ohshit”), in order to prevent users from later changing that password themselves. It then connects to a server in Lithuania, from which it downloads new files and data, and to which it sends data recovered from the infected iPhone..

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Just a couple of days ago, we ran a story on how you can use BlackRa1n to jailbreak your iPhone and get more out of it than you would under Apple restrictions. It’s no secret that Apple and AT&T are not exactly fan of the jailbreak community. If you are trying to tightly control a platform, you certainly don’t want your customers to find a way to get around your restrictions. Apple seems to be have figured out (for now) how to keep people from jail-breaking their phones by making modification to the underlying software that you get with new iPhone 3GS units.

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In case you haven’t noticed, Apple did release a small update recently that fixed a few bugs within the OS, and rendered some of the jailbreak software solutions out there ineffective. At least temporarily. But it didn’t take long for the underground Apple community to come up with a jailbreak release for iPhone OS 3.1.2. Blackra1n is a simple solution that lets you jailbreak your iPhone and iPod Touch in minutes. Here is what the developers had to say about this release:

So, what is blackra1n? blackra1n is a 30 second ALL device 3.1.2 jailbreak. Even the ipt3, but the ipt3 is tethered. In order to boot it, just rerun blackra1n.

As most of you know, jailbreak solutions are not exactly perfect. Some do let you to free yourself from Apple restrictions, but none of them are exactly 100% bulletproof software. So there is always a chance that you will have issues with your jailbreak device. There is a group of iPhone users who have no trouble upgrading their iPhone jailbreak software on a regular basis. While the process is not as risky as some think, you are still going to have to know how to downgrade or get things back to normal if you mess up during the jailbreak process.

Blackra1n is currently available for Windows machines and does not free your iPhone from your carrier. But if you are ready to take the risk and try your hand with this brand new solution, here is where you can download your copy.

We have talked about in the past few days about how iPhone 3.1 OS has rendered previous jailbreak code useless. The team behind this project took its time and has now come out with a new set of tools to help you jailbreak your iPhone 3.1 OS on your phone. The code will allow you to get the best iPhone has to offer without having to deal with Apple’s restrictions. The good news is that the software will work with iPhone 3G and older iPod Touch models. However, it is not compatible with iPhone 3GS yet. A 3GS compatible version of the software is expected to be released in the near future.

If you are planning to jailbreak your iPhone 3G (w/ OS 3.1), here is where you can pick up your code.

Unlocking iPhone is nothing new. People have been doing it for years it seems. Many iPhone owners are satisfied with the service that they are getting from at&t and don’t mind signing up for one of those expensive iPhone plans. And if you don’t like at&t, you can just buy an unlocked iPhone, right? In reality, at&t has a lot of control on what you can and can’t do with the phone. iPhone has been a big investment project for at&t, and it is not going to let you cut them off that easily. But what at&t has underestimated is the desire of iPhone owners to have more control on what they do with their device. Sure you have to sign an agreement to only use at&t as your carrier. That doesn’t mean people are going to respect that. Just take a look at all those people who are using T-mobile.

I have never felt easy about the exclusive deal between Apple and at&t. Not to say that Apple can’t decide which company they want to do business with, but it really undermines how much control we have as consumers to get the biggest bang for our buck. By not allowing other carriers to get involved with the whole iPhone movement, consumers are stuck with only two option: go with at&t or unlock the phone.

Many consumers feel helpless in the face of at&t and Apple’s determination to control everything. In reality, you can always jailbreak your phone and set your phone free. A few months ago, people still didn’t trust these jailbreak releases. Many were afraid of killing their phone. But the developers behind these applications are constantly upgrading their releases to address the latest Apple software changes. Should you jailbreak your phone? It really depends. If you are happy with at&t and have never had any desire to try any other carrier, maybe you shouldn’t. But if you are among thousands of disgruntled iPhone owners who want more from their phone, jailbreak can set your phone free. Hopefully, Apple will bring more carriers to the table once its at&t agreement is up.