what is the effect of not having the imei on the phone? why is it a big deal?

Is this IMEI disappearance a first for android phones?

Originally Posted by Lieu10ant

what is the effect of not having the imei on the phone? why is it a big deal?

Your IMEI is your phone's ID number to the network. No IMEI = goodbye connectivity to ATT/Tmobile/etc. Your phone just lost it's 2g/3g/4g capabilities. In the world of Apple, it's like your iphone turning into an ipod touch.

Originally Posted by Lieu10ant

what is the effect of not having the imei on the phone? why is it a big deal?

kite edit: That was cute - let's keep that kind of talk to ourselves, eh?


more bluntly, a phone without an IMEI won't get served a signal by AT&T, as posted earlier by someone else if you had read the topic. And what's a phone without a data OR voice connection.

Originally Posted by potentdro

Is this IMEI disappearance a first for android phones?

No, Samsung phones from way back have had a history of corruption of the EFS partition/file/whatever.[COLOR="Silver"]

This happened to me with my captivate a few years ago the only way to fix it was to send it to Samsung for a factory firmware reflash.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using xda premium

Originally Posted by niezek

This happened to me with my captivate a few years ago the only way to fix it was to send it to Samsung for a factory firmware reflash.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using xda premium

I'm going to hold off doing anything with this phone until we know what causes it or at least have a verified way to get it back.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using Tapatalk 2

A user replied in my thread about jellybean that he flashed the jb gapps and lost his imei. Maybe it depends what recovery you have?

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I747 using Tapatalk 2

Originally Posted by circuit.007

I just read this thread.. now im scared. i just flashed 2 different roms and a new kernel.

Will a previous nandroid restore it if the imei gets removed?

NO a nandroid restore has been proven unsuccessful, and I don't want to scare anyone, I want ppl to be informed! I myself have chosen not to flash anything else until more is discovered, but that's just my choice & I'm not as advanced as many users here on XDA.

Originally Posted by mmmajor

Does this affect sprint GS3 owner??

I've been to at least a half dozen hacker sites trying to locate ppl with the issue, and I've not yet discovered a sprint, or Verizon phone suffering from this issue, only gsm models . But, I can't promise it won't happen, but I would assume it doesn't affect you.