What is a Blacklisted phone?

With the increasing cost of new phones, many consumers are moving towards buying high quality refurbished devices. With refurbished phones you can get devices that are still in great condition and almost as new at a fraction of the cost from sites like Ruezone.com. The market for refurbished phones has been steadily growing for years with no sign of stopping. An important step to take when looking to buy a used device is checking if that phone is blacklisted. This is especially important if you are a business buying phones from the public. You can protect your business by using Mobicode’s instant IMEI services to get results immediately.

What is a blacklisted phone?

There are many reasons why a phone may be blacklisted. The most common are that it has been reported as lost or stolen. Insurers, networks and police forces use a centralised database to log IMEI numbers for stolen phones. When it is added to this database the phone will no longer work on the host network. As well as this, they will not unlock the phone to work on other networks. The IMEI stands for “International Mobile Equipment Identity” and is a unique identifier for every phone. To check if a phone is blacklisted, you will need to obtain the IMEI number, or use software like MobiOne to perform an automated check.

How do I find the IMEI number?

The standard way to obtain the IMEI of a phone is to open the phone application and to enter *#06# on the keypad. The device will then report on the IMEI of the phone. With many new phones you may see more than one IMEI and it is important to check both as either can be blacklisted.

Checking Blacklisting with MobiCode’s instant IMEI services

With MobiCode you can instantly check if either IMEI number associated with a device has been blacklisted by using our MobiCheck service. Entering the number on our MobiCheck service will give you an immediate result on the status of the phone. If you are a buyer of phones then you will probably not want to purchase that device. Once blacklisted the phone will no longer be able to make calls or use data services.

You can also use MobiOne to perform the check automatically. Simply connect the phone to MobiOne and it will run a blacklist check for you and report back in moments if the phone is blacklisted or not. You can register for free to make use of our IMEI services or start using MobiOne today.

Written by Nick Rose