Just under two months ago, Google mysteriously yanked the factory image for its Nexus 4 from Google Developers. Employees refused to comment on the disappearance, and speculation at the time suggested that the move might be related to the hidden (and FCC unapproved) LTE support that the smartphone has. Now, just as abruptly, the factory image is back, leaving us with only more questions.

The really odd thing is that the download’s MD5 hash appears to be the same as before it was removed, meaning that these are exactly the same files as were available before. That would suggest that the LTE-disabling theory was incorrect.

Of course, without that possibility, we’re only more confused as to why the download was ever taken down in the first place. Could it have been due to some software rights issue that Google needed to resolve? For now, the company still hasn’t commented on the situation.

Even though the Nexus 4 factory image is back, the phone’s binary files are still unavailable.

Source: Google
Via: Android Central