Apple blocks Right to Repair by making it impossible to replace the iPhone 12 camera module

Despite Apple’s claims of being pro-environment and pro-consumer, the company’s actions have consistently worked against the interest of both, particularly when it comes to the right to repair your expensive electronics using cheaper third-party resources.

We have reported before that even when Apple has been forced by Right to Repair legislation to make tools and components available to 3rd party technicians Apple has made it so onerous to actually access these resources that the option might as well not exist.

Apple has advanced their anti-Right to Repair crusade even further with the iPhone 12, according to Hugh Jeffreys, who discovered Apple has added the camera module to the list of items which are non-replaceable by 3rd party technicians.  This list already includes the FaceID module (on security grounds) and battery (on safety grounds).

Simple swapping the camera module between two identical iPhone 12 handsets caused the device to not respond to the power button, the camera app to be unresponsive, and the zoom, panorama and portrait mode feature to stop working.

It remains to be seen what reason Apple will put forward for why the camera module for one iPhone 12 is not usable on another iPhone 12, and the reason why this would prevent the power button from working, but Jeffreys video, which shows him swapping modules from 2 brand-new iPhone 12 handsets with no success clearly shows Apple have no intention of making it easy for end-users to repair their iPhones.

See the video below: