The iPhone 7 Has Arbitrary Software Locks That Prevent Repair (vice.com)

Jason Koebler, reporting for Motherboard: Apple has taken new and extreme measures to make the iPhone unrepairable. The company is now using software locks to prevent independent repair of specific parts of the phone. Specifically, the home buttons of the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus are not user replaceable, raising questions about both the future repairability of Apple products and the future of the thriving independent repair industry. The iPhone 7 home button will only work with the original home button that it was shipped with; if it breaks and needs to be replaced, a new one will only work if it is "recalibrated" in an Apple Store.

Comments

Security, yes?

[American AC in Paris]

As I understand it, this is a security measure, not an "arbitrary" lock. The home button is part of the Secure Enclave. If you let third parties make modifications to the Secure Enclave, it ceases to be secure.

Re:Not a terrible thing

[dgatwood]

This does not seem unreasonable. I say this because the home button is also a fingerprint reader, which is a security device. If a shop installs some kind of 3rd party button there, the security of the device could be compromised.

Actually, it does seem unreasonable. The proper behavior would be to detect the unknown reader and purge all fingerprints from the secure enclave, forcing the user to set up fingerprint recognition again after unlocking with the passcode. That would mean that the user would be alerted to the fact that the hardware was altered (thus preventing surreptitious swapping as a targeted attack) while still allowing the device to be repaired by swapping hardware at the user's request.

The current situation is exactly the sort of behavior that got car manufacturers a very nice set of laws that mandate repair part availability, etc. Keep going down this path, and Apple will earn the consumer electronics industry a similar set of regulations, and none too soon.