Questions about IMEI blacklist

[10yearfido]

I am familiar with the new IMEI blacklist that has recently been rolled out by the national carriers and I support the move as an effort to curb phone theft from consumers. But I have some concerns about potentially massive holes that would allow abuse of the initiative.

As I understand it, if I buy a phone from a carrier and it is subsequently lost or stolen, I can call my carrier and have the IMEI blocked by adding to a blacklist. Further, this blacklist is shared by all of the participating Canadian carriers and by many international carriers, so it will be blocked on those networks too. So far so good.

Now, I have a few additional questions and I'd really appreciate it if someone from Fido could answer each one separately.

1. If I buy a phone directly from a manufacturer, say Apple, and I use it on Fido (and call to have the IMEI added to my device equipment history list), if this phone is later stolen, can I call Fido and have it added to the blacklist?
2. If I buy a phone from someone that bought it from Fido, would they be able to later call Fido and have the IMEI blacklisted?
3. As a follow up to question 2, if I buy the phone from someone that bought it from Fido, can he and I call Fido to have the IMEI removed from his account list and added to my account equipment list? Would that prevent him from subsequently being able to have it illegitimately blacklisted? If it removed his account and is added to mine, can he still have it blacklisted?
4. If a phone is illegitimately added to the blacklist, is there any mechanism to have it removed from the blacklist?
5. If a phone is bought on subsidy from a carrier and the buyer defaults on their contract (say they "disappear") will the IMEI automatically be blacklisted by the carrier?

The scenarios I am imagining for abuse (and have now read about) are:

• Someone buys a phone from a carrier, sells it, and then calls his carrier to report it as stolen in order to make an insurance claim for a new phone. If, when it was sold to another person, the new buyer was able to have it added to their account and thereby prevent the shady original buyer from blacklisting it, that would close this avenue for defrauding the carrier and the new buyer.
• A couple breakup. One partner had both phones under their name and calls to have the IMEI of the other person illegitimately blacklisted. Can that be remedied after the fact?

I understand that it may be in the interests of the carriers to discourage buying from anyone but their stores, but the fact is that sales to occur outside of the carriers. The answers to these questions is important in order to determine whether the new blacklist is being used or could be used to undermine confidence in buying phones from outside the carriers, which was never the intent of the blacklist proposed by the CRTC.

Thanks very much for any formal answers Fido can provide.

***Edited to add labels***

[joemm210]

My phone was blacklisted due to non payment but fido here is claiming they do not do that? so what is it, is it only the owner of the phone can list a phone as blacklisted or can fido list it for non payment too?

[Cawtau]

Hello Joemm210,

  Welcome to the community!

  Are you sure your phone was blacklisted due to non-payment? Fido can, and does, suspend services due to non-payment (see Terms of Service; section 2h). However, that suspension is for services and not an actual blacklist on the device. Is it possible your services were suspended?

  If your services were suspended due to non-payment, you will likely need to contact their Credit Operations team to have them remove the suspension and make a payment arrangement. It should be mentioned that a payment arrangement may not be available in some situations.

Hope this helps 😀

Cheers

[mrf]

Hi, 

I got question after reading this thread: 

What if I buy a 'sealed' and not yet activated phone from a third party. And the phone is locked with Fido cause it was bought from Fido by the original person. Is it possible that after purchasing the phone,  original owner blacklist the IMEI? even though the phone was sealed and the first sim card used in the phone is my own sim card?

[Cawtau]

---

@mrf wrote:

Hi, 

I got question after reading this thread: 

What if I buy a 'sealed' and not yet activated phone from a third party. And the phone is locked with Fido cause it was bought from Fido by the original person. Is it possible that after purchasing the phone,  original owner blacklist the IMEI? even though the phone was sealed and the first sim card used in the phone is my own sim card?

---

Hello Mrf,

  Welcome to the community!

  Perhaps this thread will also answer some of your concerns. 

Hope this helps 

Cheers

[mrf]

@Cawtau Thanks! It helped a lot. So basically I am fine because the phone I bought was sealed and never activated by original owner. 

It also seems that after 90 days, I can call fido to unlock it for $50. Right? 

[FidoPierre]

Hey @mrf!

FidoPierre jumping in here.  

That's correct, any Fido device can be unlocked for the cost of $50+tx, in this case the phone would need to appear in your account for a minimum of 90 days. 

[KAPABLE-K]

@mrf Yes it is possible the original owner can have the IMEI blacklisted, the best way to do it is have the original owner call Fido and let them know he/she is transfering the ownership of the phone to you then have Fido add that IMEI to your account.

[mrf]

@KAPABLE-K Thanks for your reply. 

I already bought the phone,. I hope this never happens. 

I talked to a fido agent yesterday and she told me once I put my sim card in. It gets activated into my account.

What about now that I already got the phone and have no access to the seller.  Do I need to call and ask them to put it into my account ?

[KAPABLE-K]

I think you should be fine because you have the box and the first activation was done on your line.

[John416]

I am assuming my phone has been black listed because I cannot do anything that has to do with the mobile network.
I had recently purchased this phone(s6) from a friend of a friend and it was working perfectly for the first 2/3 weeks up until Friday morning.
Now my phone is basically useless and I want to know if this phone being black listed can be reversed?
What else could I do with my phone if it is black listed?
I want my money's worth from this phone and I don't want to be able to not use it anymore.
Please help fido

[kenshin33]

this is the site I used to check (I don;t know if there's an other or an official one)

http://www.protectyourdata.ca/check-the-status-of-your-device-in-canada/

[FidoAmandaH · Accepted solution]

Hi 10yearfido,

Answer to Q1: If the Fido phone or non-Fido phone has been used with your Fido SIM card, we are able to blacklist the IMEI from our end.

Answer to Q2-3:  If you have used the phone with a Fido SIM card, we are able to blacklist the IMEI from our end as we verify the equipment history. The initial user has 60 days after his last usage to blacklist the phone. The seller may blacklist it within the first 60 days to prevent any usage on the device, but after 60 days this cannot be done. Though once used on your account, you may blacklist the IMEI at any time as well. Therefore there is an uncertain period of 60 days if you choose to make a private purchase.

Answer to Q4:  The new rule is designed to help eliminate the black market for stolen devices in Canada and abroad. When you say illegitimately added it is harder for me to answer as it is not specific enough. We are only able to blacklist an IMEI when we have records that it was used by this person. For example, your friend cannot add the IMEI to their account and request a block, if they have never used the IMEI with their SIM card.

Answer to Q5:  When an account is defaulted, the price of the hardware subsidy is charged onto the account. The account will go into collections if ever the payment remains unpaid. Only by customer’s request an IMEI may be blacklisted.

------------------------------------------------

Scenario 1: The same rule will apply, there is 60 days where the initial user can blacklist the IMEI. The new buyer will have the 60 days uncertainty. When someone reclaims another device through the device protection plan, we do not blacklist an IMEI, as this is only done when the user request this.

Scenario 2: The account holder will have control over the blacklist of the devices. This is not an IMEI blacklist only policy, the account holder may decide to cancel the line, change the plan, or even suspend it after a break up as well.

I hope I was able to answer your concerns.

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[hpl912]

hi Amanda

i have previously lost a "non fido phone" but used with a fido sim card and no matter what fido did not wanted to blacklist the imei of the phone i lost since it’s not a phone purchased at fido. 

why is it the opposite as what youanswered for q1?

or can you blacklist it on your end? i still have my box so i have the imei of the stolen phone.

thanks

[10yearfido]

---

@hpl912 wrote:

hi Amanda

i have previously lost a "non fido phone" but used with a fido sim card and no matter what fido did not wanted to blacklist the imei of the phone i lost since it’s not a phone purchased at fido. 

why is it the opposite as what youanswered for q1?

or can you blacklist it on your end? i still have my box so i have the imei of the stolen phone.

thanks

---

How long ago did you lose your phone and try to have it blacklisted? The Canadian carriers only started their blacklist fairly recently, I think last September. If it was before that, then almost none of the blacklisted any phones at all (except those stolen from their own stores and warehouses).

[FidoAmanda]

Hey John416, 

Welcome to the community! 

Are you able to connect to our network at all? Are you getting any kind of error messages? 

I'd be happy to check if the phone is Blacklisted. I'll send you a PM to get things started. 

[UtkanH]

Hi there !

I purchased my iphone 6 almost 4 months ago from an individual.

I had no problem up until yesterday, and out of the blue I lost my Network at 14:00.

After calling FIDO the agent told me that my phone had been blacklisted !!

This hit me as a shock and I cannot express my frustration at the moment.

After talking two hrs on the phone I managed to talk to a SVPR and he told me that he could associate my IMEI with the phone and he would go ahead and request to have it unblocked. 

I am currently within that 24 hrs period and looking forward my phone to being removed from this list ! - No success yet.

I have few hrs left before i placing another full-blown call to FIDO.

It is non-sense to block people w/o investigating what might be really happening in the background.

In my situation, person i purchased my phone is obviously into some fraudulent activity hoping to get a free phone from FIDO to re-sell. 

[FidoKevin]

Hey UtkanH! How are you today? Welcome to our community forums

It's a real shame that this happened to you, that's not really cool of them.

There is a risk when purchasing a used phone from a 3rd party, since this 3rd party can keep a record of the IMEI, which is normally only available when you have the phone itself or the box it came in.

Removing an IMEI fromt he blacklist takes about 24 hours, usually. If you're still within that delay, don't be alarmed if the phone hasn't been removed from the blacklist yet. 

If you'd like us to look into this together, let me know and I'll send you a PM

[UtkanH]

Hi Kevin !

Unfortunately, this didnt go as expected.

I have talked to 3 different supervisors located in Montreal (funny it's impossible to locate to the same supervisor therefore I had to repeat my story again and again)

As of this AM (April 27 2016) the president's office refused me being removed from blacklist w/o any explanation. They keep asking proof of purchase as if I must buy  phone brand-new.

 I dont understand how hard is it to associate my account to the device and for the last few months and remove me from this list. 

Obviously whoever sold me the phone reclaimed it stolen/lost and i have to pay for it ! 

I would appreciate if there's anything you can help.

I need a proper explanation since this is not a convenience but more of a burden. 

Note : I have my card on secondary phone which i can be reached at for the time being : (

[FidoAlyson]

Hey @UtkanH

Unfortunately getting a used phone from a third party has it's own risks. If the original owner of the phone asked to have it blacklisted and reported it as lost or stolen, we can't remove the hold on the IMEI unless he gives us permission to do so.

[UtkanH]

non-sense . it took me 3 days to figure out what must have happened thanks to your protection of privacy policy to encourage Scam.
initial owner got a phone from Fido most likely with a 3 year contract. She sold the phone within her contract and claimed that it was stolen. You (as Fido) encourage these users by not monitoring /pursuing after. Isnt it obvious that the phone is associated to a different account and being used by me within the last 4 months. You're being a part of the Scam by providing them a free device at the first place. 2 of your field managers see the transactions and assured me that the my IMEI should override whereas your presidents office keep denying my request to be removed from this so called list. And at the end of the day its my fault because I did purchase a secondhand phone. Fair ?