Verizon shipped Tom Collery a Samsung Galaxy Z Flip7 — a folding phone — with a Mobile Device Management profile, meaning the carrier kept a remote button to wipe it. After two weeks, they pressed it. They have been "investigating" for seven.
Manufacturing one Flip7 emits roughly 60 kg CO2e. Collery owned it for fourteen days. That's 4.3 kg of carbon per day of actual phone, climbing every week Verizon stalls. I did the arithmetic on a calculator I have owned since 2019.
Hans Vestberg, Verizon's CEO, flew private to Davos to discuss "sustainable connectivity." His company's solution to a provisioning error is bricking the hardware and mailing another one. The replacement also has the kill switch. Of course it does.
The phone folds. The accountability does not.
Based on the original article "Verizon sent man a refurbished phone with MDM, then deleted his data remotely".
