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Help Question regarding rooting

L

lukebaker94

Lurker
Hey

I bought a tablet off of Amazon a few months ago and never really used it because it was really slow - a Dragon Touch Y88X. I have then sold it on eBay and the person I sold it to is threatening to report me because the tablet is "rooted". I don't really know what this means even after googling it and was wondering if anyone could tell me what this means and whether I've done anything wrong by selling this tablet without saying it has been rooted?

Cheers
Luke
 
Hello Luke!
Rooting just means something was done to the tablet to gain administrative access to files otherwise restricted without root.
If you bought it new, and don't know what rooting is, I would say it is not rooted.
What does he state to you, that he thinks it's rooted?

Edit: should clarify, when devices are rooted, the user (you) needs to install, or flash, or by other means, an exploit provided by a dev. If you didn't do that, then it is not rooted.
;)
I hope that makes more sense.
 
Thanks for the quick reply!

That helps a lot, I will ask why they think it's rooted - I certainly didn't download anything like that! Would it be possible that the manufacturers have rooted it, just in case that's what they counter me with?
 
Rooted means that it allows you to use administrator privileges.

Mainstream devices are not rooted, and you need to modify them to gain root. It's far from unknown for off-brand devices to come rooted out of the box, but from a quick web search it looks like that's not the norm for this device (at least I can find people on the web asking how to root it, which wouldn't make sense if it already was - unless they just didn't think to check!).

I'd normally say that it's good form to let someone know if you are selling a rooted device, but if you don't know what it means I don't see how you could do that. There's nothing actually wrong with selling a rooted device, but some apps won't run if they detect that the device is rooted. Was it new when you bought it?

Rooting is definitely not illegal. They have been badly misinformed if they believe that. If you are American, here's one possible explanation for the confusion (if you are not American then you don't care about the DMCA anyway ;)).
 
Ok well it was new when I bought it. If it's not illegal then, do you think I would be ok to not give this person a refund? It would mean I'm out a £5 for delivery costs and that's a lot for me as a skint student :P thanks
 
My opinion would be to assure the buyer that you did not do anything to the device as far as root, and inquire why he thinks it is.
As @Hadron stated, nothing wrong with a rooted device, but that's neither here nor there if it is indeed not rooted.
It will still function the same. (save for the "some apps won't run" bit)
 
Ah, so you are British. Then all the FUD on the web relating to US laws is irrelevant, and it's perfectly legal. The confusion usually arises from questions of whether breaking DRM (Digital Rights Management) is legal or not, which isn't the same as rooting but root would make breaking DRM easier. The answer to that is that it's a misunderstanding. In any event in the UK it's legal to circumvent DRM for the purpose of interoperability but not to break copyright (e.g. it's legal to break Amazon's DRM to read your Kindle book on a non-Amazon device, but not to pass a copy of the book on to someone else).

The interesting question is whether it was rooted out of the box, or whether there is some app the buyer wants to run that is refusing to run and (perhaps incorrectly) claiming that the device is rooted?

From a legal point of view there's no issue. The only question is how far you trust eBay to handle things fairly and reasonably, rather than just side with the complainant without making any effort?

I'd try to find out why the person says it's rooted, and explain that you bought it new and had to ask what root actually means, and see whether you can come to some agreement.
 
Ah. This might explain things - I imported a book into the google play books app. But I did then do a master reset before selling it. Does this change anything?
 
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