IMEI Change

[emreee]

I read the other posts about changing IMEI and people tell you that you have stolen the phone or bought from a person who have stolen but it is not my case.

Well my country just recently entered a new system where no cell phones that you bring to my country can be used only allowed importers or distributers can sell you and you can use..

I have a imate jam which is broken ant I know its IMEI number..if i can change the IMEI number of the new imate jamiIN from my broken jam IMEI then i can use jamin in Turkey because my broken jam is registered and you can buy it in Turkey but not jamin.

Please help me, if it is possible then i will buy it from UK when i visit there in a week.

[heliosfa]

No-Comment, as this board is not about teaching users to commit crimes or aid them in illicit acts.

Is there not a registration process you can go through to get your phone onto the database?

[emreee]

not yet there is no...

and the dumb distrubuter of imate has just brought kjam to turkey. and i talked with them they said we have no plans yet to bring jamin...

it might be illegal to change but if you ask to me the thing that i am doing is legit. i am not playing with anyones money or device.

please tell me if i am wrong

[levenum]

Hi, emreee!
You asked for opinions here is mine:

Even if some one on this forum has the information you requested, they are not likely to publish it here du to the potential damage it can cause.

Also posts about hacks (for TomTom) have been previously removed from this site by the administrator at the request of the company officials and I believe that the information you requested will suffer the same fate immediately.

So, I'm afraid you are wasting your time here, despite the name this is a legitimate forum and the only hacks here are to improve device operation or add functionality.

Finally, keep this in mind: even if you find a way to change the IMEI, you will never be able to get any support for the phone or its software, not even under warranty because if you are caught with the modifications you will be punished under your countries law (some one may correct me, but as I understand it, changing IMEI is illegal even if you own both devices).

[emreee]

thanks for your answer...it is logical...if you guys have a solition please pm me

[ninja396]

The IMEI no is unique number assiged to each mobile GSM device. Like netork device mac address it in a read only register so chnaging will be difficult.
However it is the network operator not the device manufacturer that blocks IMEI numbers on their netowrk. I would advise to contact your carrier and ask for them to unblock/register the IMEI number. Providing the IMEI is legit and the device is compitable to thier network they should accomodate you after all you pay them for the telephone and data services.

[danbrew]

i find it HUGELY ironic that folks would attempt to censor somebody asking about how to edit an IMEI # when there are all sorts of posts talking about hacking the device to sim unlock, etc. The defense that "we're" protecting some poor innocent guy who may have had his phone stolen is pretty stupid when you consider that the phones that are sim unlocked could be viewed as stolen from the carrier. Why? Suppose you buy a sim locked phone from Cingular for $300. Suppose it is the 8125. That phone would retail for $700+ if Cingular didn't sell it locked. They want your business and think they're gonna make up the difference in future service sales.

So it's ok to screw Cingular out of a few hundred dollars by sim unlocking the phone and moving to another carrier, but not ok to help somebody learn how to edit an IMEI?

Shoot - I'd send the guy directions in a flash if I knew how to do it...

[Downloaders]

The problem of your line of thinking is that
1st - Normaly you have a contract where you have to pay a fine during one or two years when you buy a locked phone (like in germany where you buy phones for 1 euro) so they get their money and you are locked
2nd - If you buy a locked phone for half the price with no contract the company who sold it to you has no lost money with the deal
3rd - For 99,9% of the worlds population its more important that when your mobile is stolen you can find it again or getting it blocked by the operator by the IMEI than a big company loosing some euros...

Yes, i am one of the poor innocent guys that works hard for his money, who had his phone stolen and found it by the IMEI ;)

[itsme]

imei changing is illegal in most european countries, and others are considering it. a few months ago, there was a news item that the dutch government is looking into starting a test-trail to see if the current law can be used to prosecute imei-changing, ... we don't want to be their guineapig.

removing simlocks is not illegal in most countries.

willem

[ZeBoxx]

It's all a bit of a grey area when it concerns SIM locks. They SIM locks are based on a business model like game consoles; often they make a loss on the device which they expect to recuperate on kickbacks from games and accessories. You could make the same argument that anybody who would hack their game console to run Linux (for some ungodly reason) is 'stealing' from the console developers. However, it's a conscious business decision to take a loss on the console, knowing full well that there may be hacks to do so. Moreoever, they know full well that somebody might buy it, play a game that comes with it, decide they like a different console better, and trash their existing one. Now this person also hasn't provided the console developer with what they expected to recuperate from fringe sales. So are they stealing, too?

All in all, it is the phone carriers that choose to go with one of typically three plans...
1. prepaid; get the device for cheap, with sim lock, and they recuperate costs - with any luck - from selling top-ups / prepaid cards / etc.
This is a business model that has success only through numbers, much like the console business. There are, however, plenty of already unscrupulous people who will buy such a device to use once, and then discard it. Then there are those who might not call enough to full recuperate the actual cost of the device. Nevertheless, I do think that usually unlocking the SIM for these devices is a bit on the black end of the grey area.

2. contract plans; get the (typically more advanced than prepaid) device for relatively cheap, with sim lock, and they recuperate the costs on your plan.
Now this is where I think a SIM unlock is perfectly valid *if* and only if you can't terminate your contract early - which you usually can't. So if you're already stuck paying $20/month for 2 years, and paid $200 for the device itself, that's $200 + $480 = $680. Now I need to jump to the third one before concluding this 2nd plan.

3. SIM-lock-free; some carriers will sell devices SIM-lock free from the get-go. This means that you get the phone they offer, which may be exclusive to them, but you can use any carrier you want. No unlocking issues here, as there's no lock.

Now here's the kicker. A lot of carriers provide 2 & 3 for the same device. Contract plan works out to be $680, but if you get the simlock-free one, it'll cost you the lump sum of $500. So if you go with the contract plan (and, again, if you can't terminate it), you already paid for the device itself - and then some. So why SIM-lock it? To get even more money... more money than the device normally costs, and even more money than you're already paying them thanks to the contract. But what validation do the carriers have for this - as they recuperated the costs, they made no loss, etc? Just more profit. So I wouldn't consider that "stealing" - that's a void of potential revenue.

And if they really, really wanted to stop you from using an unlocked phone, they can have the IMEI blocked. Unless, of course, somebody changed it.

So let's compare the pros/cons of SIM-unlocking and IMEI changing...

SIM unlock:
- carrier loses money if it's a prepaid
- carrier has a void of potential revenue if it's a contract
- consumer gets free choice of carrier

IMEI change:
- carrier can't block phone if it is stolen
- carrier can't block phone if it is being used unjustly
- networks may go wacky over two the same IMEIs if they happen to be on the same cell
- police cannot track phone in case of crime (yes, I know that anybody with enough will can do it, 'if guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have gun', yaddayadda - any proper criminal uses a disposal-worthy prepaid anyway)
- consumer loses all hope of getting their phone back
- some consumers can use their device on a network where it would otherwise be blocked for some inane reason - such as emree over here. Though they can usually apply to have their IMEI entered into the carrier's database anyway, but that's something for emree to investigate.

So from both the consumer -and- the carrier's point of view, an IMEI change is vastly more damaging than a SIM-unlock. Almost the only people who win from an IMEI change procedure are those who have stolen a phone, or found it and have no intention of returning it to the rightful owner. The people who win from a SIM-unlock is mostly the consumers, as they get free choice. Though I do suggest consumers get the contract thing or just get the non-locked devices - prepaid unlocking to me is still kinda whack.

Emree: I hope you've inquired with your carrier by now, and that the outcome is good. I see that since you posted this, you were still looking into actually buying the phone (correct me if I'm wrong), so for all we know the phone you buy will work just fine where you're at. Good luck either way :)