Jailbroken Iphone 5 with 6.1.2 won't activate but able to ssh

[randyl25]

I have a jailbroken iPhone 5 running 6.1.2. Yesterday I was playing in iFile to try to remove a persistent cookie/token/preference that an app left on my phone after uninstall (I was trying to trick it to make it think I had a new iPhone so I could leverage free trial again).

I don't believe I modified the contents of a single file! I may have changed the name of a file and then changed it back to the original name, but that is it! Yes, I'm an *****...sorry, please help though!

After I resprang my phone wasn't activated. Here is my situation/symptoms:

• The iphone is a factory unlocked iPhone 5. I'm on AT&T. SIM card works fine in my old iphone 3GS.
• I have an encrypted backup from a week ago that I can access using "iPhone Backup Extractor".
• I have root access via SSH over wifi using filezilla.
• I can only connect to unsecured wifi. When I try to connect to wifi with a password it says the password is incorrect, even though I reset two routers to make sure I had the right password.
• When I plug in my iphone iTunes gives the error "iTunes could not connect to the iPhone ..... because an invalid response was received from the device"
• When I try to activate my iPhone over wifi I get the error "Your iPhone could not be activated because the activation server cannot be reached. Try connecting ...... "
• If I reboot with up volume key pressed the upper right of the phone says "searching" but it never finds the signal -- just stays on searching.
• If I reboot without volume key pressed, "searching" never shows up. However, I AM able to swipe the top of my phone and see the SB settings box come down. If I click on "more", I am then able to see all of my applications and folders. I am able to listen to voicemails, see contacts, see recent calls/favorites, but not make calls/facetime/text. I am not able to launch a single application - nothing happens when I try to open one. I am able to use the native iPhone search function and results show up accurately. The notification center doesn't come down nor does the volume/app slider come up when I double click. I did have "springflash" installed through cydia and activator and when I triple press the light on my iPhone comes on. So overall it seems like my extensions are working but I'm not able to launch a single app.

I can enter DFU mode fine and iTunes asks me to restore...but I REALLY don't want to lose my jailbreak! Anyone have any ideas? I'm desperate!

 

[Laelipoo]

Re: Jailbroken Iphone 5 with 6.1.2 won't activate but I have root access

Well, I would try installing SAM from Cydia, using it to restore your lockdown folder (it handles activation) to stock, hitting "deactivate", putting the sim in and plugging it into iTunes. This works to attach an unlock, so it may fix whatever you did. You certainly cannot be worse off. The repo for SAM is http://repo.bingner.com. Pop that into your Cydia sources, install both SAM and SAMPrefs, and follow the instructions here.

 

[randyl25]

Re: Jailbroken Iphone 5 with 6.1.2 won't activate but I have root access

Thanks. But I can't launch any apps. :-( Not even Cydia.

 

[Laelipoo]

Can you launch it in safe mode?

 

[randyl25]

No. When I boot into safe mode it is pretty much a brick. Another thing that's different in safe mode is that it says "searching" in the upper right corner to the left of the wifi signal indicator. In normal mode the wifi indicator shows up but that's it.

 

[Laelipoo]

I hate to say it, but you may have to bite the bullet and restore.

 

[randyl25]

Originally you said that I should install SAM from Cydia and it works to restore my lockdown folder. If I have SSH access to this folder and a full backup of my iphone including the lockdown folder, can I just replace the one that is on there now with my backed up one? What exactly does the SAM app from Cydia do and can I do that myself using SSH instead of relying on the app?

 

[Laelipoo]

SAM deactivates the phone so that iTunes will re-activate it. It does restore that folder, but the point of it is to force iTunes to reactivate the phone. Changing a file cannot do that. It's the software SAM runs that is the magic.