07RR wrote:
Can someone please explain to me this business of being blacklisted??
In the USA the carriers maintain a universal database of device IDs that no carrier will allow to connect to any USA carrier’s network. This system was developed by the carriers under pressure from Congress to do so, or have the government legislate they do so.
When a device owner, with appropriate proof of ownership and proof of loss or theft, contacts their carrier, the carrier flags that device ID into the database so that it will be unable to connect to any USA cellular network. That same database is also honored by all Canadian cellular service providers as well as all Mexican cellular service providers.
Carriers can also act autonomously to blacklist devices, such as when someone finances a device through their carrier, and then defaults on the payments for that device. Or, with Apple, when someone claims a warranty or out of warranty replacement device and then fails to send the old device back (as required as part of the warranty or OoW replacement agreement), the original device may become blacklisted as it is considered stolen as it was never returned in exchange for the replacement.
There is no such thing however as a global cellular device blacklist.
P.S. in the USA the one and the only trustworthy stolen device checklist site is run by the carrier’s own trade association web site -> https://stolenphonechecker.org/spc/ and even they caution that their data is not updated in real time so may not be current in real time.
