Database Info

Super Sim Clone and others

I have searched thru these forums trying an many combo's as I could think of and couldn't find it so hopefully this isnt a repeat set of questions.
-In the Bourne Supremacy, Jason Bourne makes a copy of somebody's sim card which allowed his phone to be on the same call as that person at the same time. All the references I can find to sim cloning state that the second phone must be switched off (or it causes some kind of problem?). So is there any such way to do that with GSM? The only reason I ask is because I work for a CDMA service provider, at sometimes during an ESN swap/upgrade the system will not release the old ESN. The result seems to be that both phones ring at the same time (Though only one can answer). Basically can it be done or is it movie magic?
-During my searches I saw many results for IMEI cloning. Im not sure if I understand why you would want to do this. Some ppl wanted to trick a service provider into giving them service, and I guess some wanted to use a phone that had been banned on a network(?). But really other than using a stolen or banned phone, whats the reason for the popularity of this issue?
-Also I unlock every phone I get, and it looks like there are many US AT&T users here that use or need unlock software. AT&T's general policy nowadays is that they will supply you with the codes for no charge. Just call in and say you bought the phone and will not be using their service. Basically no question asked. Tmobile will give you the code after 90 days with active service, and might give you the code if you arent planning on using their service. So is there another reason for unlocking the phones thru software as opposed to just getting the code? (Is it better, does it do more for you?)
And not a question but a huge, THANK YOU SO MUCH to all of you guys for doing what you do. VP3G's 8525 ROM is awesome (^_^)y

No
in regards to the sim, NO

IMEI changed at repair -Legal or not?

Before the default question is assumed - no I DON'T want to change the IMEI!
HD2 was sent to HTC repairer, and came back with a different IMEI but same serial number. Looks like they've reprinted the battery-compartment label as it matched the software readout. BUT - and here's the rub - the box and paperwork no longer match the phone.
Question is, could this give rise to legal issues, particularly if/when I sell the phone?
Should I demand that it's put right.
Incidentally, while they were at it they managed to convert a sim-free phone into a branded/simlocked one. I imagine the repairers replaced the mobo with an incorrect one. I can fix the branding, thanks to this site's howtos, but not the IMEI issue.

I don't know what country you're in, however here in the UK it is illegal to change your IMEI and can result in up to 5 years in prison.
I would therefore go to the repairer and ask what is going on. I presume you went to a reputable person. Though they would be unlikely to do this.
Maybe get law enforcement involved, as a crime has been committed.

I'd contact HTC first, and find out what is going on...Odds are they have given you a different handset, and just moved over the Software number. Call HTC is should all be logged and accessible by there call center staff.

About what I thought
It's the official UK HTC repairer. They say the IMEI is different because a replacement board was fitted. -Well OK, but then why did they reset the serial number but not the IMEI? And, why leave it with mismatched labels? If that is the only resolution when a board is changed, they urgently need to look-at their procedures.
"Thank you for your reply. According to our system, your phone is branded to O2 network but it has not got a SIM lock. We have replaced a motherboard in your phone and that is why the IMEI number in the menu of your phone does not match with this one form underneath of the battery. HTC is legally obliged to lock this phone. We can not unlock this phone without the expressed permission of the network provider."
Which tells me that firstly, they didn't read what I said properly. Secondly they are saying that they knew the phone was supplied to them as unlocked, but have locked it nevertheless. At least, that is the way it reads.
I'm getting onto Trading Standards about it.
Thx for advice, will let you know how this pans-out.

well this is crap..

I bought my droid ultra for $150 off of craigslist, I checked the serial and IMEI and everything was fine. now after this morning, the phone all of sudden says out of service, and when i go online to check out the IMEI it says it is blacklisted..
Is there a IMEI unlocker for this phone? or anything i can do? I might just throw it on Ebay and call it a day...

Sounds like someone sold it then called it in as stolen or lost, if you can contact the seller it's worth finding out although they'll more than likely avoid you like the plague. Don't use the contact info you did when you reached them, use a different email/phone number if possible, you might get lucky.
Aside from that and maybe getting somewhere in that respect (probably not going to happen but there's always a chance) the phone is effectively dead to you in terms of being used but it depends on the carrier.
If you're checking it against Verizon (which calls it the ESN) and it shows as blacklisted that doesn't mean it can't be used with GSM carriers since the Ultra/MAXX/Mini are all GSM unlocked. The IMEI (which is what GSM carriers refer to it as) could still be potentially "open" and not blacklisted.
Worth checking out. There is still no one single "blacklist" that every cellular carrier in the world checks or reports their ESN/IMEI numbers to or with - it's a crap shoot but worth finding out.
Other than those possibilities, if you can't get anywhere then dump it. Changing the ESN/IMEI is possible but requires pretty specific hardware (JTAG stuff iirc) to get it done and even then it's basically flat out illegal to do it so, it's always possible that you could go through all the crap to make it work on a network and then get popped for it just the same.
Good luck...

[Completed] T-Mobile Blocked my IMEI on used phone

Hi Im new here and needed some clarification regarding an issue with my IMEI on my T mobile Note 2. I bought it used back in June off of a facebook buy and sell group to fix it up and sell it. At the time I bought it, it had a clean IMEI, and the people who sold me the phone told me they were the original owners. a few weeks ago, I again checked the imei, and it was still clean.
Now Im about to sell the phone, but I check one more time and now its blacklisted on T mobile and Metro, but clean on ATT and Verizon according ti imeidata.net. I check tmobiles website and it says its been reported lost. Im going to try to contact the people who sold it to me, and if they wont help me, Ill be contacting Tmobile and Asurion. After doing some research about what else I can do, Ive came up with a few options, but I still need some advice.
1. Sell as is and cut my losses
2. Sell on ebay to someone outside of US
3. Sell for parts
If I sell it to someone outside the country, how do I know it will work wherever the buyer is? I have no intention if screwing anyone over and want to make sure they get what they pay for.
How can I protect myself from this happening in the future? Is there a way to get the IMEI numbers of future phones signed over to my name, even if Im not a customer of that phones carrier?
Also, if imeidata.net says its only blacklisted on Tmobile/metro, can it be used on other American networks?
I really appreciate any help with this. Thanks.

One more thing I forgot to mention...when I bought it, it was running android 4.1.2. I downgraded it to 4.1.1 to unlock it and its still running 4.1.1 incase the unlock procedure didnt work and I need to try again. Not sure if this is relevant to the imei issue but Im just putting it out there.

Hi,
If it's blocked, it's blocked. No one can help you with that legally. Sorry.
Whether it works in other carriers.... I would doubt it. Usually blacklists are across all carriers in North America.
And as far as protecting yourself in the future, you can't really. Buying a used phone is always going to be a gamble. Nothing you can do about that except try to buy from a reputable source or individual.
Good luck!
Thread closed.

S8+ IMEI Help

Ok so this is going to be a long one... sorry in advance if I've broken any site rules posting here (made an account so I could make this post).
First, I work retail loss prevention for an off-brand retailer (in the USA). About 3 months ago we found a T-Mobile s8+ in one of our fitting rooms. The phone was turned into me via one of the store employees where I let it sit in my office for 3 days while turned on, hoping someone who knows the original owner would call it. No one called, so I took the phone to my local T-Mobile store to turn it in or see if they could contact the owner. The T-Mobile representative told me that they would be unable to take the phone from me, or give me any information regarding the owner. So the phone sat in my stores Lost and Found box for 30 days as policy. Once those 30 days passed our policy states to throw out the phone with the normal trash. Being an expensive phone, and the technology lover I am, I kept the phone which I had all legal right to do since the store had thrown it out.
The phone itself had a pin-lock and probably some sensitive data regarding the previous owner which I was able to clear out via a re-flash of the OS on the phone (i'm not a bad guy I didn't want their personal data).
So, obviously, the phone itself has an IMEI number reported as "Lost" with T-Mobile. Which means I'm basically unable to use it on our carrier (Metro PCS), however my wife was using it for the camera and other apps while at the house.
Flash forward another month and my wife's phone begins to start acting up so I figured there could be some way to work out to let her use this s8+ (I own a normal s8 myself and have no real use for the s8+). So i called T-Mobile customer support, explained the situation described above, and they told me I would need to take the phone to a Samsung store to have the device refurbished? Well, I drove about 30 minutes out to the nearest Samsung store to be told they don't perform such a service.
So I decided to look into altering the IMEI# of the s8+ to a clean IMEI of my wife's current phone or an older one we no longer use, and all the laws and specifications regarding what can and can't be done. All I could dig up regarding IMEI laws in the US was here: congress.gov/bill/112th-congress/senate-bill/3186/text/is -- Which isn't actually a law it's a proposed bill that never got passed. I did find some stuff from the FCC about cell phone cloning fraud:fcc.gov/consumers/guides/cell-phone-fraud -- but this also doesn't exactly fit my situation since we only want to use one phone, not two under the same identifications. There also is the concern of 'is it really fraud if I own both phones in question?'.
So this brings us to the current status: I have this phone that I obtained legally with a bad IMEI and cannot use it for everyday purposes.
Any help on how we can get the phone to a usable state would be greatly appreciated.
[Edit update]: I realize this is a very unusual situation, and am fully aware of the stigma regarding asking what to do regarding bad IMEI numbers and just want to clarify that I do not intend to break any laws or act with malicious intent to others. I simply want to have a phone, which I own legally, working.

Best your gonna get on this is google can be your friend. We dont discuss this in any form here.

Starhound said:
Ok so this is going to be a long one... sorry in advance if I've broken any site rules posting here (made an account so I could make this post).
First, I work retail loss prevention for an off-brand retailer (in the USA). About 3 months ago we found a T-Mobile s8+ in one of our fitting rooms. The phone was turned into me via one of the store employees where I let it sit in my office for 3 days while turned on, hoping someone who knows the original owner would call it. No one called, so I took the phone to my local T-Mobile store to turn it in or see if they could contact the owner. The T-Mobile representative told me that they would be unable to take the phone from me, or give me any information regarding the owner. So the phone sat in my stores Lost and Found box for 30 days as policy. Once those 30 days passed our policy states to throw out the phone with the normal trash. Being an expensive phone, and the technology lover I am, I kept the phone which I had all legal right to do since the store had thrown it out.
The phone itself had a pin-lock and probably some sensitive data regarding the previous owner which I was able to clear out via a re-flash of the OS on the phone (i'm not a bad guy I didn't want their personal data).
So, obviously, the phone itself has an IMEI number reported as "Lost" with T-Mobile. Which means I'm basically unable to use it on our carrier (Metro PCS), however my wife was using it for the camera and other apps while at the house.
Flash forward another month and my wife's phone begins to start acting up so I figured there could be some way to work out to let her use this s8+ (I own a normal s8 myself and have no real use for the s8+). So i called T-Mobile customer support, explained the situation described above, and they told me I would need to take the phone to a Samsung store to have the device refurbished? Well, I drove about 30 minutes out to the nearest Samsung store to be told they don't perform such a service.
So I decided to look into altering the IMEI# of the s8+ to a clean IMEI of my wife's current phone or an older one we no longer use, and all the laws and specifications regarding what can and can't be done. All I could dig up regarding IMEI laws in the US was here: congress.gov/bill/112th-congress/senate-bill/3186/text/is -- Which isn't actually a law it's a proposed bill that never got passed. I did find some stuff from the FCC about cell phone cloning fraud:fcc.gov/consumers/guides/cell-phone-fraud -- but this also doesn't exactly fit my situation since we only want to use one phone, not two under the same identifications. There also is the concern of 'is it really fraud if I own both phones in question?'.
So this brings us to the current status: I have this phone that I obtained legally with a bad IMEI and cannot use it for everyday purposes.
Any help on how we can get the phone to a usable state would be greatly appreciated.
[Edit update]: I realize this is a very unusual situation, and am fully aware of the stigma regarding asking what to do regarding bad IMEI numbers and just want to clarify that I do not intend to break any laws or act with malicious intent to others. I simply want to have a phone, which I own legally, working.
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This is illegal and will bring you to jail so dont even try it

kpwnApps said:
This is illegal and will bring you to jail so dont even try it
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In most countries yes not all but either way frowned talks on xda

Update: I no longer need assistance.
Side Note: Here is the US law regarding changing mobile identification numbers: govinfo.gov/app/details/USCODE-2011-title18/USCODE-2011-title18-partI-chap47-sec1029

Starhound said:
Update: I no longer need assistance.
Side Note: Here is the US law regarding changing mobile identification numbers: govinfo.gov/app/details/USCODE-2011-title18/USCODE-2011-title18-partI-chap47-sec1029
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Yes as that may be true. But the rules here on xda as well as the rest of the world prohibit this. I do agree with you on the law here in US though. ???

Starhound said:
Update: I no longer need assistance.
Side Note: Here is the US law regarding changing mobile identification numbers: govinfo.gov/app/details/USCODE-2011-title18/USCODE-2011-title18-partI-chap47-sec1029
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That law is surpassed by the cell phone cloning act of the early 90's. In the US it is illegal to alter the IMEI or even have tools that allow you to do so. It effects the IMEI and ESN (for older phones) many sites have been closed down for it. XDA has a very strong stance against it.
https://www.fcc.gov/consumers/guides/cell-phone-fraud

solitarios.lupus said:
That law is surpassed by the cell phone cloning act of the early 90's. In the US it is illegal to alter the IMEI or even have tools that allow you to do so. It effects the IMEI and ESN (for older phones) many sites have been closed down for it. XDA has a very strong stance against it.
I'm not really here to argue if the act is illegal or not (it is). But, to point out I also wasn't exactly asking on instruction on how to change an IMEI.
I only asked what laws are in place that specify the legality of the situation (which has been solved), and what -can- be done in this situation (remains unsolved).
-Thank you
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Starhound said:
solitarios.lupus said:
That law is surpassed by the cell phone cloning act of the early 90's. In the US it is illegal to alter the IMEI or even have tools that allow you to do so. It effects the IMEI and ESN (for older phones) many sites have been closed down for it. XDA has a very strong stance against it.
I'm not really here to argue if the act is illegal or not (it is). But, to point out I also wasn't exactly asking on instruction on how to change an IMEI.
I only asked what laws are in place that specify the legality of the situation (which has been solved), and what -can- be done in this situation (remains unsolved).
-Thank you
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The only thing that can be done is turn it in to t-mobile. If I t was me. I would turn it in to t-mobile so they can return it to the proper owner.
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solitarios.lupus said:
Starhound said:
The only thing that can be done is turn it in to t-mobile. If I t was me. I would turn it in to t-mobile so they can return it to the proper owner.
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I attempted to do exactly that about 3 days after the phone was turned in to me (as described in original post). T-Mobile refused to take it from me. Nor would they give me information to contact the owner. Maybe that's not their standard policy, I don't know.
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Starhound said:
solitarios.lupus said:
I attempted to do exactly that about 3 days after the phone was turned in to me (as described in original post). T-Mobile refused to take it from me. Nor would they give me information to contact the owner. Maybe that's not their standard policy, I don't know.
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I can tell you that is not their policy. Mail it to the corporate office with a letter saying what happened and where you took it. That person will be fired on the spot. But that is up to you. Either way it is useless unless you use it on att.
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Starhound said:
solitarios.lupus said:
That law is surpassed by the cell phone cloning act of the early 90's. In the US it is illegal to alter the IMEI or even have tools that allow you to do so. It effects the IMEI and ESN (for older phones) many sites have been closed down for it. XDA has a very strong stance against it.
I'm not really here to argue if the act is illegal or not (it is). But, to point out I also wasn't exactly asking on instruction on how to change an IMEI.
I only asked what laws are in place that specify the legality of the situation (which has been solved), and what -can- be done in this situation (remains unsolved).
-Thank you
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I have your same issue. A phone was forgotten on the bathroom of my cafe and nobody reclaimed for more than 6 months. Once tried to used after this long time the phone seems to be reported lost and imei locked. I cleaned up the phone to erase all the old personal information but not able to use it.
I understand the role on this forum and nobody want talk about it. would be really appreciate if you can privately point me to the right direction to make the phone working.
I won't contribute to the pocket of a lot of people on youtube or ebay selling the service for 50 pound. This is not a businness for me but just try to use a phone instead of bin it
Mine is a G950F model
Thanks
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