Mobility Site Minute

Mobilitysite Contests

Mobility Site Videos

Mobilitysite Polls

Mobilitysite Reviews

Home » AT&T, Opinion, Rogers Wireless, T-Mobile

If you lose that iPhone you are on your own!

Sep 29th

Posted by Keisha Barwise

Share
Tagged: , , in AT&T, Opinion, Rogers Wireless, T-Mobile

2-despair We’ve all read our fair share of stolen iPhone fiasco’s, this weekend i came across case that really struck a cord with me. I came across a forum post where the user had “found” an iPhone and was proceeding to set it up as his own. It really irked me that despite how easy it would be to put in anti theft measures, especially with a device like the iPhone, North American providers and Apple have turned a blind eye.

No big brother type shakedown, just implementation of technologies that currently exist in our devices. (Because the scenario rings true of any phone and we’ve all gone through it at some point or other.) Though prevalent in Europe, why is it that no IMEI Blacklist exists in North America? Though Apple registers your serial number when you connect to iTunes, and claims in their manual that it is partially for anti theft purposes, Why can’t a device be locked out of iTunes if it doesn’t comply with it’s original setup information? Or Apple help with locating IP’s? Why is it the web is full of stories of users who’ve lost or had their devices stolen, who turn to either company for assistance and encounter both companies playing the blame game as to who has dropped the ball?

Neither AT&T, Rogers in Canada or Apple are prepared to lock down a device reported as stolen and it lends to the question why?? The answer this writer has come up with? Greed. Why discourage theft, when you can have two customers for the price of one? Why discourage theft when you can sell a second device, unsubsidized or sell another copy of Mobile Me? Let’s not even get into the fact that insurance isn’t offered on the device, though it is on other smartphones.

So what’s your recourse as a consumer? When you’re opening your wallet for that next gadget purchase, use a credit card like American Express…your purchases are covered for at least 90 days (though not on the Corporate card), or consider adding your device to your home owners or renters insurance, though a lost/stolen device could increase your premiums, because if you lose your device the only person holding the ball is you.

Image Credit

Post to Twitter Post to Yahoo Buzz Post to Delicious Post to Digg Post to Facebook

Keisha Barwise (9 Posts) - Website | Twitter | Facebook

Former associate editor @ Techie Diva's Guide to Gagdets, and current Moderator at Tablet PC Review. I'm a final year medical student who loves technology. It's a huge part of my life, and i'm always on the search for new & emerging technologies and how we can harvest them to make our lives more efficient. Though i can definitely appreciate the cool factor:)

Related Posts

« What happens when you use the wrong tool
HID Drivers for the Viliv X70 »

You can also participate in other conversation in our active forums with 200,000 other Members. It only takes 2 minutes to sign up one time for free in the forums.


  • Why discourage theft when you can sell a second device, unsubsidized or sell another copy of Mobile Me?

    I'm confused about the device sale comment. If I lose my device (and it's still in the subsidy period), I'm going to have to buy an unsubsidized device anyway. So what does whether AT&T or Apple locks down the first device have to do with the sale?

    Maybe Apple gets a new MobileMe subscription or AT&T gets a new data plan subscriber, but unless Apple or AT&T actually helped you recover the device, I don't see any device sale argument here.

    Steve
  • Actually, Mobile Me is not tied to a device, but to a user. A user could own any number of Macs and iPhones with that me.com account.

    Though I think his point is that AT&T and Apple are unmotivated to help return a stolen device because they will gain a sale by not recovering (through product replacement.)
  • The user who found the iPhone would likely want to set up his own Mobile Me account, right? So it could result in another sale.

    As for selling devices, I understand that not helping recover the device oould lead to a sale. My point was that IMEI blacklisting the device wouldn't because the user would have to replace the lost device anyway. (Unless you think that fewer devices would be stolen or more lost devices would be returned, of course.)

    Steve
  • I didn't think of that angle, but, still, I'm going to guess that somebody who steals an iPhone (or without the ethics to return a found one) is not likely to pony up $99 a year for MobileMe.
  • I'm sure that one reason is wariness against lawsuits. Scenario: guy sells an old, deactivated iPhone on eBay. New person activates it. Just for "fun", first guy reports it stolen and demands it be deactivated. The last thing that the mobile companies, Amazon (with the Kindle), Microsoft (Windows computers occasionally do WGA requests, right, so Microsoft should be able to provide IP addresses of at least some stolen computers) and other hardware manufacturers will want to do these days is separate valid requests from spurious ones (which is why they will do something if they get a warrant from a court.) But I suppose the conspiracy angle about selling more devices is far more attractive, eh?

    The NY Times had a great story about this weeks ago.
  • I thought it could also be done for pranking. I know your phone number, and call to have your phone deactivated. However, I assume most carriers require you to verify your identity when you call (providing not just the phone number but last four digits of your SSN or something). That should help prevent pranking.

    As for your scenario, maybe that's an issue with GSM carriers, but it shouldn't be with CDMA. If I sell a phone, I have to call my carrier to remove it from my account (and possibly let them activate my new phone). If I then try to call back and tell them to deactivate the old phone, I doubt they would because it's no longer on my account.

    Do GSM carriers require you to tell them what phone(s) you have? As you can move your SIM card from one phone to another so easily (assuming no carrier lockdown), I think that would be tougher to police.

    Steve
  • That's why an IMEI blacklist would make more sense, currently GSM providers will "lock down" the sim, but not the device, which as you mentioned is useless, you just change the sim card. However everytime that you put in a providers sim card it automatically registers the IMEI on their network.

    In the same way that some users try to evade the iPhone Data plan by switching their sim to a dumb phone, they switch the sim, and the providers systems pick up a different IMEI and can downgrade the plan, but if you switch the sim back to the iPhone the system can identify the device being on the network, users are blocked or filtered and told that they need to upgrade to a smartphone data plan.

    So if it can alert the change of device, how hard would it be to alert or filter a reported device?

    And again...this the lock down or bricking of reported devices is done in Europe.

    I actually came across an article where the head of the GSM fraud and security division was asked about why there was no IMEI blacklist in North America, and his response was that North American providers don't see theft as prevalent or pervasive enough to warranty an IMEI blacklist.

    I don't even think the biggest feature of the IMEI blacklist is tracing your device, the biggest feature is as a deterrent, why would you steal a device you know could become a pretty paper weight?
  • I don't even think the biggest feature of the IMEI blacklist is tracing your device, the biggest feature is as a deterrent, why would you steal a device you know could become a pretty paper weight?

    For feature phones, that may be true. However, for smart phones, the person would still get a PDA.

    For example, if I stole your iPhone and you got its IMEI blacklisted, I might not be able to make calls, but I'd still have an iPod Touch, right? So there would still be incentive to steal smart phones. (In the case of the iPhone, I suppose blacklisting it from iTunes would reduce the incentive some because you couldn't put new media or apps on it.)

    And even blacklisted feature phones might be useful to some people, like the ones that have digital cameras or media playback.

    Steve






  • article re GSM association head (at the time) of fraud and security James Moran
    http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/07/23/rogers_...
  • Ricahrd
    The only other possible idea I can come up with against lockdown is emergency use. The cell carriers are required by law I believe to provide emergency service to even deactivated phones. So as long as that cell can get a signal, sim card or not if you can power it up 911 must work. Maybe they are incapable of following the law and disabling the phone. Then again maybe its just easier to not get involved in he said she said disputes over who owns a given phone.
  • On Verizon, I get the impression that they can deactivate a device (remove it from your bill) but still keep it active for 911 calls. I'd be surprised if other U.S. phones didn't work the same way.

    Out of curiosity, do GSM phones require a SIM card for 911 calls?

    Steve
  • Exactly CDMA providers in North America do have an ESN Blacklist....the ESN number is equivalent to the IMEI for GSM devices.

    and to answer your question re 911 calls, when i remove the sim from my phone and restart it...here's the message i get

    "The SIM Card is missing. You can still make emergency calls if your service provider supports it"
  • Exactly CDMA providers in North America do have an ESN Blacklist....the ESN number is equivalent to the IMEI for GSM devices.

    Is the ESN blacklist really across carriers, though? I always assumed it was just on Verizon (or whatever carrier you reported the loss to).

    and to answer your question re 911 calls, when i remove the sim from my phone and restart it...here's the message i get

    "The SIM Card is missing. You can still make emergency calls if your service provider supports it"

    Thanks for checking. I couldn't imagine it would comply with the law if the phone had to have a SIM card (even if deactivated).

    Steve
blog comments powered by Disqus