Business

A phone bill that users will welcome

A new bill in Congress aims to give mobile customers what they never knew they wanted: the right to unlock their phone and take the device they paid for to a new carrier.

The Wireless Consumer Choice Act would order the Federal Communications Commission to let subscribers “unlock any type of wireless device” that lets them use “commercial mobile services and commercial mobile data services.”

The bill is in response to the Library of Congress ending an exemption in January to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act that since 2006 had let consumers unlock their phones without the threat of the DMCA’s strongest provision: a $500,000 fine and five years in prison.

The DMCA sets up the Library of Congress as the steward of the act and requires review every three years.

“Lowering the costs and impediments for consumers choosing to switch carriers helps the market work better. In order for competition to truly discipline the market, consumers must have the ability to vote with their feet,” Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), who co-sponsored the bill, told The Post. “This bill would provide that certainty and let consumers know they truly own the devices they’ve spent hundreds of dollars on.”

“Consumers shouldn’t have to ask permission to do what they want with their mobile devices,” he added.

Another bill, the Wireless Device Independence Act, sponsored by Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), aims to do the same thing.

“Our bill assumes that the consumer owns the phone and the copy of the software on it,” said a Wyden aide.

Part of the impetus for the bill, Blumenthal said, was a petition for unlocking rights on whitehouse.gov that gained more than 100,000 signatures.

The move has the backing of the Obama administration, but should face strong lobbying opposition from the wireless providers.