Today on the call in listeners were informed what some of us always have known. If you enter *#06# on your mobile or if you have your IMEI number the carriers (Digicel/LIME) are able to disable a mobile phone when reported. The big question asked on another blog: do these carriers block, create a database which list stolen phones and whether requests to add services to phones at Digicel/LIME locations scan the stolen IMEI database if one exist.

Such a procedure would go a long way to counter the cellphone tieffin business which is on the rise.

@Chris

There is opportunity for those making the big bucks to educate the people perhaps?

I have called both LIME and Digicel about this and they have both told me that they cannot and will not block any IMEI numbers from using their their network, so if your phone is stolen, you’re up sh!t creek!

If this is the policy of LIME and Digcel then it is a crooked policy and needs to be challenged.

It is comparable to receiving stolen property and knowing it.

What is FTC’s position on this?

A search of the web reveals that india has mandated operators to block IMEIs

http://www.cellular-news.com/story/46248.php

The question is, what are we going to do about it?

Is the Prime Minister responsible for Telecommunications?

Can we petition him to change the law where these service providers will have to register the IMEI number and block them when a phone is stolen?

The same way they can turn off your account when you do not pay the technology can block the stolen phone.

@Techie

Receiving reports of calls dropping and ‘circuits unavailable’. This seems to be affecting users in the other islands as well.

BLOCKING WILL HELP SOLVE THIS PROBLEM! Really is is too simple for the company and police to realize?

@David et al…

As Clone above points out, it is technically trivial to block a phone from accessing the network. They do it every day — whenever someone’s “prepaid” funds run out or the “postpaid” customers haven’t paid their bill.

My advice, as a geeky consumer advocate, is anyone who has their cell phone stolen should first report it to the police, not their service provider.

The reason is someone who has stolen a cell phone is very possibly also involved with other illegal activity, and so rather than blocking a stolen phone, “lawful interception” of that phone’s usage might be very fruitful for further law enforcement activities.

And please note it is possible to determine the geospatial position of any cell phone at any point in time to within about five meters, even if said device doesn’t have a GPS receiver. This involves analysing the signals received by the cell base stations — not only the base station handling the cell phone at the moment receives their signals, and the base stations have military grade time signals. This can be post-processed so long as the data is collected.

But a very important point: once the report has been made to the police, the customer should be exposed to no further charges while the police conduct their investigations.

As an aside, and additional advice: I am always amazed by how few cell phone owners have a password on their phone which prevents usage (other than incoming call reception).

Yes, it means you have to enter your password each time you want to use your phone, but as always, security and convenience are opposing. Wouldn’t it be much more convenience to be able to enter your house or use your car without using a key?

How many would ever do that?

@Chris

Have you factored that the police getting customer info is not as routine as you have made it.

The question remains, are we having collaboration between the carriers and the police on the tieffin of mobile phones.

When you lose you cell phone you have to buy a new phone but you keep your old number.

The thief can call the service provider and get a new plan on the stolen phone.

That is how it used to be in Toronto until someone suggested that the service providers were profiting from stolen goods and were an accessory after the fact or some such legal definition.

If the Senate of Barbados was not a toothless tiger, the preserve of political aspirants, perhaps Senator Sandiford Garner might have found a way to champion legislation which forces LIME, Digicel and any other carrier to comply with blocking IMEIs and any other initiative to help.

@seeker… Absolutely agree.

This was debated at some length at the HIPCAR review of the BB cybercrime legislation.

A court order is required for interception of communications by the police (or, more accurately, by the service providers upon request of the police) to be lawful.