Stolen mobiles 'will be blocked'

[Guest tsutton]

Around 80% of mobile phones will be blocked on all five UK networks within 48 hours of being reported stolen in future, industry leaders have pledged.

The pledge is part of a charter aimed at reducing mobile phone crime launched by the Mobile Industry Crime Action Forum (MICAF) and phone networks.

More here

[Guest dr who]

Makes you wonder WHY this hasn't been the case up to this point.

[Guest kam_]

It was on the list for ages, but the networks didn't want to fork out for a shared database like alot of europe has.

Also they lost any lingering interest when phone insurance was completly handed off to third party companies - its a service they sell on behalf of insurance companies and not simply outsourced like before.

Anyway looks like government pressure will force them to finally do it.

[Guest ricardo the fish]

I always thought that once reported stolen, the IMEI was blocked by all networks anyway. Obvioulsy I've been mistaken.

Now lets just hope that this new charter works correctly.

[Guest chucky.egg]

No, you were right, but the time it took varied.

TBH though, from what I've heard, all the lost handsets end up in Europe anyway.

Too little too late

[Guest pisquee]

The system needs to be global, otherwise it is never gonna work, as blocked UK mobiles will continue to be ebayed out of the country. I have seen auctions admitting the phone is blocked from UK networks!

[Guest goochy1]

The system needs to be global, otherwise it is never gonna work, as blocked UK mobiles will continue to be ebayed out of the country. I have seen auctions admitting the phone is blocked from UK networks!

Ah you make a great point there pisquee - but what i don't understand is how will they know which phone to block as my phone isn't registered or the sim come to that i bought the sim off lichfield market in Nov so how will they manage to block the phone when i don't know serial numbers or anything??

goochy1

[Guest mwright]

Ah you make a great point there pisquee - but what i don't understand is how will they know which phone to block as my phone isn't registered or the sim come to that i bought the sim off lichfield market in Nov so how will they manage to block the phone when i don't know serial numbers or anything??

goochy1

All you need to do is make a note of the IMEI number and give that to the network if it is stolen/lost.

[Guest goochy1]

All you need to do is make a note of the IMEI number

Ok thanx where abouts would it be

[Guest mwright]

[For some reason I could not reply]

Depends what phone you have.

For Nokias at least you can enter *#06# and it will display the IMEI

But I guess most phones have it on a printed label somewhere - probably inside under the battery

[Guest goochy1]

[For some reason I could not reply]

Depends what phone you have.

For Nokias at least you can enter *#06# and it will display the IMEI

But I guess most phones have it on a printed label somewhere - probably inside under the battery

I have a nokia 6230

[Guest confucious]

*#06# works with ALL phones unless I'm mistaken.

[Guest kam_]

I always thought that once reported stolen, the IMEI was blocked by all networks anyway. Obvioulsy I've been mistaken.

That was the plan some years ago - there was suposed to be a global database setup in northern ireland, but it never materialised. If your phone is reported stolen it usually only gets blocked on that one network. Recently (a few years) phone insurance moved from being owned by the phone networks to being outsourced. More recently it moved to third party companies and the phone networks offered to sell you their policies. These insurance companies would offer policies on multiple networks and so would have access to block handsets on multiple networks.

Consequently if your phone is insured, it will get blocked on ALL UK networks. If its not, it will only be blocked on the one network you're on.

No, you were right, but the time it took varied.

TBH though, from what I've heard, all the lost handsets end up in Europe anyway.

Too little too late

Well like i said it depends on the insurance situation... You're right most phones go to europe and some poor soul finds out when he tries to roam with it.

The system needs to be global, otherwise it is never gonna work, as blocked UK mobiles will continue to be ebayed out of the country. I have seen auctions admitting the phone is blocked from UK networks!

Your right, they really should have setup a global system like they are trying to in the US, and which they have partialy setup in europe. The problem is no one wants to pay for it, especially now with the uk market reaching saturation.

Ah you make a great point there pisquee - but what i don't understand is how will they know which phone to block as my phone isn't registered or the sim come to that i bought the sim off lichfield market in Nov so how will they manage to block the phone when i don't know serial numbers or anything??

goochy1

Well.. if the SIM is registered (or contract of course), then you report your phone stolen to your network, and they will block the SIM, AND the last handset it was used in. If you ask them not to block the handset they will get very suspicious but agree not to. If you're insured, when you attempt to claim on the insurance, they will block the handset you registered with them - of course you can't request for them not to!

If your sim is not registered, then you CAN NOT ask your network to block your phone in this way since you can't authenticate with them and prove the sim is yours. Also you can't simply quote some IMEI and ask they block it, without proof the phone did belong to you. Otherwise that would leave room for a funny but very mean prank :)

If you have insurance, you will have registered the IMEI with them when you took it out, so the sim is irrelevant. In that case you can ask them to block it by making a claim.

[Guest goochy1]

Well done kam_

I bet that took you ages - ok cheers for the info

goochy1

[Guest kam_]

hehe not really i used to work in the industry :)