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sorry this is slightly off-topic, and apologies if this forum is unsuitable. it's about a samsung e700 phone i also own.
I bought it secondhand from someone on ebay (stupid me) about 6 months ago (before i got the xda) and it later stopped working, first on o2 then soon after on all UK networks.
I enquired at an o2 shop and they said it is black-listed and nothing can be done about it.
My questions are:
1. will the imei block be global, or just UK? if not then i give it to a friend in tanzania when i go there next week
2. Is there any way to overcome the IMEI block?
hope someone can advise me, before it goes in the can!
cheers
International Mobile Equipment Identifier
I'd say from the first word that yes, it's probably not going to work in Tanzania either.
Blocked IMEI number usually just means one thing - stolen phone. Noting can be done about it either.
The identification is international, but blocking is operator dependant. except that often all the operators of the same country share their database of stolen devices. I guess that this database is not worldwide shared. So could de probably used in other country.
1. will the imei block be global, or just UK? if not then i give it to a friend in tanzania when i go there next week Smile
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As far as i know the IMEI is only blocked in the UK (dont quote me on it though )
2. Is there any way to overcome the IMEI block?
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Click to collapse
On some phones you can change the IMEI number that is blocked on that phone, but bear in mind it is illegal in this country so not advisable.
I would take it to Tanzania and check if it will work ... if not then bad luck but if it does then your mates got a new phone
It will work outside of UK
Thanks to everyone for the advice, I will take it to Tanzania and see if it works. My friend will be very happy if it does, otherwise I'm sure he could find a shop with equipment to change the IMEI number - probably don't have laws abou it there!
cheers,
Paul
Good news! I am now in tanzania and the phone works fine on the network that my friend uses. He is very pleased with his "new" phone.
Nice, hot and sunny here, but no XDA to play with. Just my baby, friends and nice empty beaches and warm water to swim in. Oh how much I miss the UK :wink:
no one have any idea how to spoof or change the IMEI?
omega_ said:
no one have any idea how to spoof or change the IMEI?
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Er....why?
Yes actually I do. Quite simply a physical way, which is not illegal in some areas and also you can do it by imei manipulation, but that requires playing with other peopels systems.
will defonatly work abroad.
the phone will only be blocked to UK networks
so should work abroad
Hi guys
Newbie question here
Im looking for a note 2 in Craigslist, some offers say "bad imei" and they have minor prices
For what I've read, the bad imei doesn't affect if I unlock the phone and use another carrier (I will use it in mexico)
am I correct?
Thanks in advance
Sent from my Vivid 4G using xda app-developers app
Thanks for the question. I too am curious about this.
As long as it's in another country and carrier, you will have no issues with a bad imei.
Keep in mind you're buying stolen goods, either directly or indirectly. Is that something you're comfortable with?
entropism said:
Keep in mind you're buying stolen goods, either directly or indirectly. Is that something you're comfortable with?
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Click to collapse
Well, I didn't think about that
You're right
And no, I dont want to be a part of that
It really depends. Someone may interpret a bad imei as blocked/blacklisted or completely missing. If the first owner was inexperienced at flashing they may have not made a back up of the efs folder and lost the imei. If they didnt fulfill the contract with a carrier it could also get it blacklisted. And then also the possibility it was reported stolen.
Sent from my G Note 2!!!
A friend of mine told his carrier he were robbed to use the insurance and sell that phone
Here in Mexico, in 2012 the president made a law to block IMEIs in robbed cellphones
But most people its ignorant about the laws and rights -_-
So, that law isnt even working XD
Back in thread, Theres no way to know if my next Note2 its stollen or lost, etc
So im buying Used, but good imei
Carriers in the u.s. are going to start blocking imeis on all carriers. If u put ur sim in a stolen device on att ur service will be suspended. Right now they are in the process to stop stolen imeis from working on other carriers here and out of country.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I317 using xda premium
Sorry, I didn't want to pull the morality argument, because I usually hate people who do that. But yeah, even the phones that were blocked due to the contracts not being fulfilled? 75% of that is usually someone coming in, buying 5 phones on an ID where they don't care about their credit, and never paying the bill. Stolen phones.
Sago6 said:
Well, I didn't think about that
You're right
And no, I dont want to be a part of that
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Click to collapse
Hi,
How can we report "phone stolen" in Mexico ? The phone was bought in Canada and thus is associated with a Canadian operator, however the phone was stolen as soon as I arrived in Mexico, that too inside the flight by a fellow passenger.
Can the Canadian operator blacklist my phone IMEI even though it is in Mexico ? Or can I call the Mexican Telefonica company and then can blacklist this IEMI so that the phone can never be used in Mexico ? Please guide me through this, I'd be eternally thankful.
I am really worried and I have had such a bad experience in Mexico, firstly at the international airport in Mexico City the shopkeepers tried to make me pay more than I should, then my phone is stolen.
Thanks in advance,
Sanjeev
sanjeev2612 said:
Hi,
How can we report "phone stolen" in Mexico ? The phone was bought in Canada and thus is associated with a Canadian operator, however the phone was stolen as soon as I arrived in Mexico, that too inside the flight by a fellow passenger.
Can the Canadian operator blacklist my phone IMEI even though it is in Mexico ? Or can I call the Mexican Telefonica company and then can blacklist this IEMI so that the phone can never be used in Mexico ? Please guide me through this, I'd be eternally thankful.
I am really worried and I have had such a bad experience in Mexico, firstly at the international airport in Mexico City the shopkeepers tried to make me pay more than I should, then my phone is stolen.
Thanks in advance,
Sanjeev
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Click to collapse
I've never had to deal with this, thank goodness, but you can try contacting your carrier (if you used the phone on your line, they should have a record of the device) and have it blocked on your carrier's network. However, since it's not an official phone sold by the carrier, they may not make your request a priority. It's worth trying though! It's also worth trying (if you actually have the phone info- imei/serial) to contact the Canadian carrier with a report so it can't be sold & activated on their network again in the future.
I know, it's old thread, but it came up in Google results while I was researching my questions. What do you guys think, buying a carrier locked blacklisted phone in Canada, can it be unlock, make it sim free? and why assume it is stolen phone. A person bought used iPhone from kijiji, totally working phone. In a few days, original owner claims it as stolen and carrier black lists the phone (in Canada). The buyer now has no use of it in Canada. He can try to unlock (sim free) the phone and send it overseas, like Europe, or Asia. I don't see anything wrong here, just looking for your opinion. Thank you.
I believe parts of Europe have a blacklisting system in place so the imei should be checked before trying to network unlock the phone for use in another country.
Many people assume that a phone has been stolen because the imei has been blacklisted and, as you pointed out, this is not always the case.
I'm not 100% sure but some unlockers will not or cannot unlock a blacklisted phone.
Greetings.
It seems I'm facing a weird problem here.
To begin with, I live in Europe and I've just bought a Verizon M8.
After boot, a pop up reads that this sim card is not from Verizon.
Although, my sim card CAN receive calls and messages (there is also the app from my carrier services) I cannot make any calls.
What happens is that when I'm trying to dial a number, +1 appears in front of the phone number and call is dropped.
+1 is the phone code for the US.
Well, I don't want this.
I thought every single Verizon 4G phone was carrier unlocked out-of-the-box.
To be honest, I know it, because there is some kind of legislation forcing Verizon to sell their 4G phones unlocked.
Could anyone please help me?
What should I do?
Flash another firmware? And which one?
Solution
Alexcxvtr said:
Greetings.
It seems I'm facing a weird problem here.
To begin with, I live in Europe and I've just bought a Verizon M8.
After boot, a pop up reads that this sim card is not from Verizon.
Although, my sim card CAN receive calls and messages (there is also the app from my carrier services) I cannot make any calls.
What happens is that when I'm trying to dial a number, +1 appears in front of the phone number and call is dropped.
+1 is the phone code for the US.
Well, I don't want this.
I thought every single Verizon 4G phone was carrier unlocked out-of-the-box.
To be honest, I know it, because there is some kind of legislation forcing Verizon to sell their 4G phones unlocked.
Could anyone please help me?
What should I do?
Flash another firmware? And which one?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
for the first issue of prefix:
Go to Settings>Call>Assisted Dialling. - Here select your country in "current country"& "reference country"
If that does not work, turn off assisted dialling itself
Member Dodge DeBoulet's suggested this already and worked.
Thanks anyway, man. Good to know there is help when it's needed.
[Q] Newbie here - unlocked i317 "MM#6 Phone not allowed" for overseas network
hi all,
I'm new to this forum and its great to be associated with such a wonderful group
I bought an unlocked AT&T note2(i317, android 4.1.1 and firmware- i317UCALJ2) off ebay.com and got it to India a month back from WA.
I have been trying to configure mobile network on Indian carriers but always got these errors :
- " your sim card doesnt allow connection to this network" and "MM#6 phone not allowed"(MM#6 appears only since yesterday)
- the network bar(i.e. signal strength icon on home screen) doesnt capture the local networks at all which is quite surprising.
- Phone's IMEI(35700..) doesnt match IMEI on the back panel(35542..)
I heard about cases where phones purchased from ebay/craigslist getting blocked ( for example, http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2341622) but I guess that shouldn't stop it from using overseas? Also, I heard IMEIs of such blocked phones look like "null", "0"s etc. but IMEI of my phone looks good and doesn't showup in the list of blacklisted IMEIs on swappa or CheckEsnfree. Lastly, I also checked the GSM bands of i317 and they are definitely compatible in India.
Can someone kindly help?
Many thanks in advance.
Chaitanya.
I would like to add that I have tested SIMs from multiple carriers but failed to locate networks and APNs. All other features like WIFI, Bluetooth etc are working like a charm so I suspected if it got to do something with the IMEI.
I request some guidance from the experts in pointing to the issue so that I can try the workaround(Sorry..Im a novice at troubleshooting android )
Kindly let me know or redirect me to a forum if already exists.
Thanks,
Chaitanya.
Could you please say your baseband? It's in settings> about> phone.
rangercaptain said:
Could you please say your baseband? It's in settings> about> phone.
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Thanks for your reply mate.
Here are the details:
baseband - I317UCALJ2
CSC - i317ATTALJ2
Bootloader - i317UCAMH3
The good news is your phone is clean stock.
The bad news is your phone is blacklisted, and the IEMI was hacked/changed.
The only legal way to solve this is to contact the original carrier (I'm guessing AT&T USA), give them your IEMI, tell them you bought it legally in the USA, and ask them to unblock it. The blacklist is all US carriers and their overseas versions, all European carriers and their subsidiaries. Like Orange or Voda or t-mobile.
rangercaptain said:
The good news is your phone is clean stock.
The bad news is your phone is blacklisted, and the IEMI was hacked/changed.
The only legal way to solve this is to contact the original carrier (I'm guessing AT&T USA), give them your IEMI, tell them you bought it legally in the USA, and ask them to unblock it. The blacklist is all US carriers and their overseas versions, all European carriers and their subsidiaries. Like Orange or Voda or t-mobile.
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Click to collapse
My bad..I should have checked the status beforehand in detail. Till now I was only aware that bad IMEI phones arent allowed majorly in US only (saw many such phones being sold on ebay intended for international use ).
As far as I know, i317 is only the at&t version of note2 in US and it differs a lot from its International versions (gt 7100, 7105 etc). Do you still think this blacklisted issue holds good in countries where i317 isnt available?
Since sending the product back to US is highly unlikely, can you kindly let me know the best way I can get the issue fixed?
Answered in my post above. From India you can probably use the tech chat from AT&T website.
It's a blacklist of disallowed IEMI's so the model is irrelevant.
rangercaptain said:
Answered in my post above. From India you can probably use the tech chat from AT&T website.
It's a blacklist of disallowed IEMI's so the model is irrelevant.
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Click to collapse
Thanks Rangercaptain for your clarification. I tried AT&T's live chat but it seeks registered contact details to login. Is there any email support?
Not sure if these kind of questions are allowed here but I heard there are tools that help to retrieve lost IMEIs (which work on rooted phones).
In case it gets tough to get hold of AT&T, can I try any of such tools on my phone since it is not registered in my county anyway and doesnt come with any warranty?
P.S:I know changing IMEI is illegal but I guess retrieving it is not :fingers-crossed:
chaitanyapatwari said:
Thanks Rangercaptain for your clarification. I tried AT&T's live chat but it seeks registered contact details to login. Is there any email support?
Not sure if these kind of questions are allowed here but I heard there are tools that help to retrieve lost IMEIs (which work on rooted phones).
In case it gets tough to get hold of AT&T, can I try any of such tools on my phone since it is not registered in my county anyway and doesnt come with any warranty?
P.S:I know changing IMEI is illegal but I guess retrieving it is not :fingers-crossed:
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Click to collapse
I started to think may be the motherboard got changed(since S/N also looks different and the phone looks absolutely new with no wear at all)?
I'm being forced to think that IMEI is clean because some followup with AT&T and US Samsung care have confirmed that the phone's back IMEI and S/N are definitely good with warranty till 2015 and don't show up in any of the blacklisted lists.
I'm sorry for posting different questions but please note that I'm not much aware about this phone's history and I'm trying to openly share the results from my extensive findings. Thanks!!
If you're sure everything is clean are you sure your Sim card is correctly provisioned for the network? The easiest way to find out is to trade cards with a working phone.
Before you think about trading main boards (I did that because the gps connector was broken) go to www.mobiletechvideos.com and see what they can do for you.
rangercaptain said:
If you're sure everything is clean are you sure your Sim card is correctly provisioned for the network? The easiest way to find out is to trade cards with a working phone.
Before you think about trading main boards (I did that because the gps connector was broken) go to www.mobiletechvideos.com and see what they can do for you.
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Click to collapse
Yes, I have been trying this on a working sim with an active data plan which is currently working on my xperia.
Over the last 2-3 days, I have learnt that flashing a wrong ROM sometimes might corrupt EFS folder that stores IMEI,serial number etc., and reinstalling firmware through ODIN(which requires to download original stock ROM separately) or KIES software might restore the lost EFS folder.
I thought of giving this a try and accordingly reinstalled the official firmware but without any success.
Can someone redirect me to any such guides/threads that might help? If it doesnt happen then I would like to close this thread and create a new one for EFS related troubleshooting.
If efs is corrupted there is no s/n or imei shown. It displays null
I bought a lg g8 sprint unlocked refurbished for 370 dollars, the seller said it works on all GSM unlocked, will i use it in brazil, will i have some problem in using on GSM Operators?
You shouldn't have any problems, I've got the US T-Mobile version that is unlocked which works fine in the UK. Only way is to test it...
I bought an unlocked VERIZON G8 (also a CDMA network like Sprint) I was able to activate it in MetroPCS and data and text messages worked but I wasn't able to get the phone to make or receive calls.
Hopefully you won't have the same problem. I had to return mine. I suspect the phone app was the problem. It had a lot of options specific to Verizon. I wish I would have tried a 3rd party phone app...
sprint is cdma or gsm?
SantinoInc said:
I bought an unlocked VERIZON G8 (also a CDMA network like Sprint) I was able to activate it in MetroPCS and data and text messages worked but I wasn't able to get the phone to make or receive calls.
Hopefully you won't have the same problem. I had to return mine. I suspect the phone app was the problem. It had a lot of options specific to Verizon. I wish I would have tried a 3rd party phone app...
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Click to collapse
juninhoak said:
sprint is cdma or gsm?
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Click to collapse
Sprint is CDMA. Just because a phone is unlocked and has a clean IMEI does NOT mean it will work 100% on another carrier
SantinoInc said:
Sprint is CDMA. Just because a phone is unlocked and has a clean IMEI does NOT mean it will work 100% on another carrier
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Click to collapse
the seller said that my g8 will work 100% or any gsm unlock carrier, should i trust it?
juninhoak said:
the seller said that my g8 will work 100% or any gsm unlock carrier, should i trust it?
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Click to collapse
From my experience I would say NO.
wilpang said:
You shouldn't have any problems, I've got the US T-Mobile version that is unlocked which works fine in the UK. Only way is to test it...
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Click to collapse
what about the price? 370$ for 10/10 no signs of use, without box clean imei
Is it a seller from China?
juninhoak said:
what about the price? 370$ for 10/10 no signs of use, without box clean imei
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Click to collapse
Did you get it via eBay? Sounds like a bargain though
I should get mine next week from USA for a similar price.
I had read that the Sprint one will work if it's unlocked. The Verizon one should as well. I'm thinking if there are issues, it would be due to carrier specific software?
Sent from my LM-G820 using Tapatalk Pro.
I am using an unlocked Sprint G8 in Switzerland and it's working fine. But check what bands are used by your carrier and whether the different carrier versions support them.
Hoping someone can assist. I bought a LG G8 on Ebay from what appeared, and appears, to be a legitimate seller. The IMEI comes up clean on swappa and all other verification sites. The phone IS unlocked and works perfectly fine on my carrier, Telus, in Canada.
The issue I have is that each time the phone boots up, restarts, etc, I get the messages seen in the attached:
1) Activate Your Device - Please wait while we activate your device for network service. This may take several minutes.
2) Activation Incomplete - This device has not been registered with an account. Please contact your service provider to configure this device for network service.
When I contact Sprint they claim that I need to contact the original account holder as only they can unlock the device, and activate it, and it will only be unlocked if in good standing and active at least 50 days. They also claim the only method to unlock is via them.
I was hoping for some advice here on how to get rid of this nag screen, or what I can say to get Sprint to resolve this.
Thanks!
Other than the 'nag' screen the rest of the phone is fine, you can make calls and use 4G?
I have a T-Mobile one which I will sell because I couldn't get it unlocked via US T-Mobile, they wanted it activated in the US and get a prepaid 100 dollar SIM card.
wilpang said:
Other than the 'nag' screen the rest of the phone is fine, you can make calls and use 4G?
I have a T-Mobile one which I will sell because I couldn't get it unlocked via US T-Mobile, they wanted it activated in the US and get a prepaid 100 dollar SIM card.
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Click to collapse
Correct, 4g and calling works.
Do any of you have a Unlocked Verizon G8 and have it successfully work on a GSM network...in particular were you able to make and receive phone calls? That is where I had a problem.
Sean09 said:
Hoping someone can assist. I bought a LG G8 on Ebay from what appeared, and appears, to be a legitimate seller. The IMEI comes up clean on swappa and all other verification sites. The phone IS unlocked and works perfectly fine on my carrier, Telus, in Canada.
The issue I have is that each time the phone boots up, restarts, etc, I get the messages seen in the attached:
1) Activate Your Device - Please wait while we activate your device for network service. This may take several minutes.
2) Activation Incomplete - This device has not been registered with an account. Please contact your service provider to configure this device for network service.
When I contact Sprint they claim that I need to contact the original account holder as only they can unlock the device, and activate it, and it will only be unlocked if in good standing and active at least 50 days. They also claim the only method to unlock is via them.
I was hoping for some advice here on how to get rid of this nag screen, or what I can say to get Sprint to resolve this.
Thanks!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have the same issue as well. I deleted sprint bloatware via adb. But I can't find a way to get rid of the nag screen. The phone is certainly unlocked though. I also can't enable wifi calling.
Guys, im using my G8 sprint unlocked on "TIM" and "VIVO" the 2 biggest carriers from brazil, working fine calls, 4g, sms, and mobile data, by the way, this fone is freaking nice for the price, i paid 380 + 120 taxes on ebay, in brazil galaxy s10 costs 900 usd with exynos processor
I have to take some of what I said back. I did a factory reset of my Sprint LG G8 and it is worse than before. I can't edit or add/select a proper APN. Right now the working APN has a mix of Metro and Sprint. MMS doesn't work, forget group texts. I have to send it back. It may be somewhat unlocked, but way too much of a hassle. And with no bootloader unlock, I'm stuck.