Assuming some type of police report is required to start this process, I would think the fact that filing a false police report is a crime would be the deterrent to stop people from doing that. I certainly hope that a person can't just walk into AT&T and say "my phone was stolen" and AT&T just adds it to the system based on their word.
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AT&T Unveiling New Blocking Service for Stolen Phones Next Week
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Assuming some type of police report is required to start this process, I would think the fact that filing a false police report is a crime would be the deterrent to stop people from doing that. I certainly hope that a person can't just walk into AT&T and say "my phone was stolen" and AT&T just adds it to the system based on their word.
Apple will include an optical disc drive in the next generation of MacBook Airs before AT&T brings back unlimited data.
Why all the hate and distrust over the process? Verizon, for one, has been doing this for a long time.
I was shocked when I considered purchasing an ATT iPhone to find out that they DIDN'T do it. Needless to say, I didn't buy the phone and I remain with Verizon.
I was shocked when I considered purchasing an ATT iPhone to find out that they DIDN'T do it. Needless to say, I didn't buy the phone and I remain with Verizon.
Wouldn't need it. I am sure the account holder has to be the one reporting it. You can report your phone stolen now without any verification, as long as it's your phone.
Good intention, wrong process.
Let the stolen phone be activated and then send the gps/tower coordinates to your local PD.
Remote wipe feature is useless. Can pull all data and reset the phone before owner even realizes.
Most police departments are very busy, they don't have time for this. Hell even trying to get them to follow a "find my iPhone" signal is rough. I have cop friends in large cities that get 10 - 20 reports a day of stolen phones. (Their district, not the whole city) They don't have the resources to do anything besides write a report and hope it turns up later.
Not to mention, just getting the location won't do much. How do you track down a single phone in an area of thousands of people ?
If they were to go this direction, it would become as useful as lojack ended up being. Cops had them in the cars, but they more or less ignored them. It was far too much effort to track down a single stolen car. They would rather it pop up in front of them.
If that's the case then I would be very hesitant to buy a used phone from someone I didn't know.
Verizon and Sprint, because of their networks can track the phones easier, so it's a lot easier for them to block (since you can't use their phones on another network anyway)
All carriers announced in April that they are going to keep their own databases and then merge it into a national database of stolen phones to prevent use of stolen phones.
I wonder how they will know you are saying the truth. Otherwise I could give someone else's SN or IMEI and have their phone blocked? Or what if you tell them your numbers and they mistype? A different phone would be blocked?
Not sure how well this could work, maybe they should do this: you bring your phone to a store now that you have it, they see you really have the phone in your possession, enter it into your account and then if you ever call to block it, they will know you really had the phone and aren't lying.
Not sure how well this could work, maybe they should do this: you bring your phone to a store now that you have it, they see you really have the phone in your possession, enter it into your account and then if you ever call to block it, they will know you really had the phone and aren't lying.
But the rate of individuals doing that is minimum in comparison. How many kids in school or other individuals are using stolen phones in the US?
I believe is a good initiative.
In my home country, Venezuela, is normal for you to be killed for a BlackBerry just because carriers do not block stolen phones, there is a huge market for them.
If it's bought from Craigslist just do the transaction at an AT&T store.
On eBay, you'll easily get your money back by filing a dispute.
Took them long enough. This should of been in place well before the first iPhone even hit the market.
What they need is a world wide shared DB that can have blacklisted phone in it. Sad part is the US is years behind the rest of the world on this front.
Nothing has been said about letting the former owner get a replacement at least than the cost the contract status demands. For all we know, there won't be. You lose your phone even by thief and you'll pay up to full price and have to deal with not having insurance etc to cover the costs
As long as they add a fairly easy way for users to check a devices legitimacy before buying I have no problem with this.
Apple isn't doing it now. They have always and will likely always be hands off on issues of lost and theft outside of the times that someone actually files a police report and the police request they do something.
only if someone wants it 'legally' unlocked. And if someone is devious enough to steal a phone or at least refrain from returning a lost one, they are probably devious enough to use unauthorized methods to unlock it and then sell it for a song.
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Knowing them you can only file on the phone that is currently linked to your line. That linkage validating your ownership of the unit.
Already basically exists. It's called Find My iPhone and it is in iCloud. Trouble is that all one has to do is restore the phone and it is back in order.
Apple maintains their place out of this whole recovery game because they have neither the time nor the inclination to try to validate claims of theft etc. It's too easy for you to piss me off so I claim you stole the phone that I bought you to jerk you around and Apple wants to avoid that. They are not the cops after all. And don't want to be any more than they want to be your ISP, your cell carrier etc.
The best you can hope for with Apple is that this ATT thing forces folks to unauthorized unlock the phones which will brick them and Apple will catch that that is what happened and deny all service to the current owner. Lesson learned for the guy that bought it from some dude on Craigslist etc
I've been saying this for years and I can't believe a carrier has only just come up with it... Surely ALL phones have an identifier, like computers have MAC addresses, surely phones something similar, something that isn't via the SIM card, thus enabling the carriers to (a) pinpoint any phone reported stolen and (b) cease all communication to cellular network except tracking. If it was able to go via a hardware identifier, then even iPhones stolen from the shops could be bricked as Apple would surely have a list of codes... Lets face it, Apple have them serialised and each serial number in unique.