Smart Phones: A New York Times Project

Michael Nagle for The New York Times

For any cellphone user, it has never been a hassle to keep their cellphone number when having to go through the process of switching their wireless carriers. However, keeping an old phone on a new carrier is often a hassle and sometimes not allowed by carriers. A new proposal by the Obama administration and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) proposes that consumers should be able to switch carriers and keep their old phones.

This proposal comes from the FCC’s current administration under Julius Genachowski after the Copyright Office of the Library of Congress made it illegal for consumers to use unlocking software on their mobile devices to use on a different network. The goal is to ask Congress to overturn the 2011 ruling and allow consumers to move to a different network without the hassle of purchasing a new phone. Advocates for the proposal such as R. David Edelman, a senior White House advisor, believes that such a change would bring consumer choice, competition, and innovation to the market.

These days purchasing an unlocked phone is typically much more expensive to purchase than a phone with a 2-year contract. For example, an unlocked iPhone 5 would amount to $649 while an iPhone held by a contract would amount to $199. Today an unauthorized unlocking of a cellphone, according to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, could lead to a $500,000 fine and up to five year in prison. This specific law was first passed in 1998, over a decade ago and long outdated. While the copyright office reviews their policies every few years, in 2012 they did not review the laws regarding the legalities behind cellphones.

As for now the Library of Congress and the copyright office, both part of the legislative branch, have been urged by the White House and the FCC to review last year’s ruling.

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Jane Hahn/European Pressphoto Agency

Somewhere in India a little boy is pounding on a computer battery to extract cadmium, while at the same time covering their skin in toxic materials. In another village, women are busy “cooking” circuit boards to retrieve the slivers of gold. These images are prevalent all around the world, from Guiyu, China to a federal prison in the United States.

With the rise in new technology and demand for new phones, consumers are constantly buying new cell phones and disposing of their old cell phones. In 2010 alone, Americans have disposed of 150 cell phones. Disposed cellphones and other electronics, otherwise known as “e-waste”, have found new homes all around the world, most notably impoverished places. Upon arrival the e-waste is put into piles and often burned to extract copper metals, gold, and silver thread. Both scientists and the World Health Organization both agree that exposure to elements such as lead, cadmium, and mercury contribute to serious health risks.

Even though the United States is an industrialized country, we are the only country that has not ratified the Basel Convention, an international treaty that outlaws the exporting and trafficking of e-waste that is deemed toxic. The problem also lies in little effort to bring the change though law. A bill introduced in 2011 called the Responsible Electronics Recycling Act attempted to discourage dumping e-waste in the world’s poorest countries and endorse better waste management in the United States; the bill was never put up to vote.

The solution to combat toxic e-waste is not an impossible. For example, the European Union introduced regulations to ship disposed electronics back to their manufacturers; this plan predicts that 85 percent of waste would be recycled by 2019. In Japan, companies that produce electronics must have or find recycling facilities for their products.

While our government and the industries in the United States are unwilling to create an initiative to stop the problem, consumers have the power to change. Consumers could hold onto their electronics for longer periods of time or use certified recycling services. As consumers and citizens of the world, we must take steps towards becoming more responsible for our waste, take the initiative and recycle.

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