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How to check if a phone is stolen

How to check if a phone is stolen

The BBC recently published an investigation that found a number of mobile phone shops in London are willing to purchase stolen phones, meaning you could then be buying them.

According to the National Mobile Phone Crime Unit, 250,000 to 300,000 mobile phones are stolen in the country every year, so here are a few tips on how to make sure you aren't buying one of them.

What happens?

If a phone has been lost or stolen, it is likely that the user will have requested it to be blocked through their mobile phone carrier, whether this be Vodafone, O2, EE or any of the others.

Once a phone is blocked, it won't be able to be used on any network as the carriers have an agreement between them. However, in some cases, the person or shop you bought the phone from could have unblocked it, which is against the law.

With O2, Tesco or Orange, the phone will power up but you won't get a signal and you won't be able to make calls. Phones on Virgin, Vodafone or T-Mobile will look like they are working and have a normal signal, but it will reject the call when you try to make it.

Find out the IMEI number

If the phone isn't blocked when you receive it but you are still unsure, or you haven't bought it yet, you can check whether is has been reported lost or stolen by using its IMEI number.

This number is a 15-digit number that identifies the phone and it is often asked for when you are insuring a device. You will find this number on the box the phone came in but if you are buying a phone without the original packaging or online, it can be a little more tricky.

In some cases, the IMEI number will be on the device itself, for example, if you take the back off a Samsung Galaxy S4 and lift up the battery, the number is displayed underneath.

Other devices, such as a HTC One, won't have the IMEI number on the device itself but there is still a way to find it out.

For all devices, you can dial *#06# (star, hash, zero, six, hash) on the keypad and press call. This should then bring up the IMEI number you need. If you are looking to buy a device online, then it's worth asking the seller for the number so you can check.

Checking the IMEI

Many local phone shops will be able to check the IMEI number for you to see if it has been reported lost or stolen, but you can also do it yourself if you need a quick answer.

There are a number of websites, some free and some you have to pay for, but the cost of checking is certainly better than finding out you have bought a stolen phone.

CheckMEND charges £1.99 for a report on the device's background history and it will work for anything from a mobile phone to a Sat-Nav or gaming console.

The site has access to over 50 billion records of global data, from over 18,000 police agencies, 65 mobile phone networks from 30 countries, so you should be able to find out pretty quickly if something isn't right.

If you don't want to pay, you could try imeidetective.com or numberingplans.com but whatever you do, make sure you check before you buy.




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