question about buying used iPhones

[xxcysxx]

hello folks,
i'm curious of something.
let's say a seller is a legitimate owner of the iPhone device, and i buy this phone from him and pay in cash and the transaction clear smoothly. next day the guy call in to claim his iPhone device is stolen and get's a free replacement iPhone. now the iPhone i got from him is marked stolen, and cannot be connected to any network for service. now what?

can this be possible. i get a lockdown on my device because it is marked a stolen device, and i cannot use it?

thanks

 

[Small White Car]

Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think he'd get a free phone for that. They'd make him buy a new one.

So he has nothing to gain by doing that unless he really wants to screw with you for some reason.

 

[vonWachtstain]

hello folks,
i'm curious of something.
let's say a seller is a legitimate owner of the iPhone device, and i buy this phone from him and pay in cash and the transaction clear smoothly. next day the guy call in to claim his iPhone device is stolen and get's a free replacement iPhone. now the iPhone i got from him is marked stolen, and cannot be connected to any network for service. now what?

can this be possible. i get a lockdown on my device because it is marked a stolen device, and i cannot use it?

thanks

Are we talking GSM or CDMA? With GSM iPhone even if its reported stolen you can still use it without repercussions (damn pity for us GSM owners) In cas of CDMA (like Verizon or Sprint) once owner has them reported the carries will blacklist the phone and at the same time render your iPhone useless. You will not be able to activate it. It will be a very expensive iPod Touch.

 

[digitard]

The only way he could do that CDMA wise (Sprint/Verizon) is if you bought the phone from him, but he didn't take it off his account. Then reported it stolen.

If that was the case, though, you couldn't have activated it at all. This is why you should ALWAYS do the deal at a Carrier store to be able to activate it right there. At the very least you can take the MEID of the phone and verify it's clean with the carrier.

In short, though, if this happened... you're kind of SOL to be honest. If they pulled that scam then basically what happened is they had you pay whatever hundred bucks. Never took it off their phone account. Immediately called in stolen. Filed an insurance claim and paid the deductible. Gets a new phone sent, and they clear your extra cash and pocket it.

It's a despicable practice, but you have no way of saying you bought the phone because it was never off their account. So all the records point it as being an active phone with that person at the time of "loss" (aka sale to you).

 

[xxcysxx]

gsm. i use tmobile.
this doesn't happen to me, knock on wood. i was thinking of creative ways a clever scammer would think. the kind of claim i was talking about was when the seller has a protection plan like an insurance for the device incase it damage or stolen. i like to save a few coins here and there but if the trouble outweigh the saving then i might as well pay retail.
i'm thinking of buying a iPhone on craigslist, the one that is sealed and un-open. since it is not remove from the box i would assume it probably hasn't been turned on and activate yet.
or perhaps an open box one but cosmetically immaculate.

 

[doodads]

hello folks,
i'm curious of something.
let's say a seller is a legitimate owner of the iPhone device, and i buy this phone from him and pay in cash and the transaction clear smoothly. next day the guy call in to claim his iPhone device is stolen and get's a free replacement iPhone. now the iPhone i got from him is marked stolen, and cannot be connected to any network for service. now what?

can this be possible. i get a lockdown on my device because it is marked a stolen device, and i cannot use it?

thanks

Whose iPhone did you steal?

 

[xxcysxx]

no no, i didn't steal anyone iPhone. i'm trying to be cautious of situation like this. i saw a lot of at&t iPhone 4s on craigslist for sale and thought of creative situation like this. like the seller would make an insurance claim on his iPhone being as stolen after he sells it.
since the gsm iPhone (at&t) doesn't suffer from this situation then i'm not going to worry about it.

you shouldn't be too quick to make accusation like that. just because i ask a question for knowledge purposes to defend myself doesn't mean i will use it to my advantage. after all we are all here to learn and share ideas. and who knows, i might just helped a bunch of peoples already just by asking this questions.