Before You Pay · Blacklist Status

Lost & Stolen Device Register

A loss or theft report sticks to the handset, not to whoever is selling it. Run the IMEI while you can still walk away — afterwards the problem is yours.

15-digit IMEI

Dial *#06# on the handset to display its IMEI.

This check runs against a live device database. Create a free account to run it.

Takes a moment, and your results are saved to your account.

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Why It Matters

What a blacklisting actually does

The blacklist is a shared register of IMEI numbers, kept between mobile networks and the GSMA (Global System for Mobile Communications Association). An owner tells their network the handset has gone, the number goes on the register, and networks reading that register refuse the handset a connection — no calls, no texts, no mobile data, whichever SIM is pushed into it.

The block travels with the hardware, and it crosses borders, because networks share register data between countries. There is no unlocking your way out of it either: a network lock can be lifted by the network that applied it, while a loss report can only be withdrawn by the person who filed it. Resale value goes the same way — a listed IMEI is worth spare parts.

So check the number first, and then read a clean result for what it is: nobody had reported that IMEI at the moment we looked, and nothing more. A theft from this morning may not be on the register yet, and the register says nothing about who owns the phone, whether it is still being paid off, or whether an account is still signed in to it. Check the number, then still ask for the receipt.

Reading the result

Clean

No report against this IMEI when we looked

Blacklisted

A report exists — networks can refuse the handset

Warning: Paying for a listed handset buys hardware you cannot put a working SIM into, and one that is hard to move on afterwards. Run the number while the seller is still standing in front of you.

FAQ

Questions Buyers Ask

Can a listing ever be lifted?

Sometimes. Where the person who reported the handset tells their network it has turned up, the network can take the number back off the register. Where the listing came from an unpaid balance on a financed handset, settling that balance can clear it. A handset listed as stolen is a different matter and is rarely lifted, so never buy one on a seller promise to sort it out later.

Does a listing follow the phone abroad?

Usually, yes. Register data is shared between networks through the GSMA, so a handset listed by a network in one country is generally refused by the major networks in others. Coverage is not total — smaller networks do not all consult it — but relying on that means relying on a handset somebody has reported missing.

I have already bought one. Where do I stand?

Holding a listed handset is not in itself an offence, though knowingly selling a stolen one is. In practice your argument is with the seller rather than the network, and a network cannot undo a report it did not make. Keep the advert, the messages and the payment record, because that is the only evidence you will have.

What puts a number on the register?

An owner reporting the handset lost or stolen to their network is much the most common route. Handsets caught up in insurance fraud go on as well. So do contracts that stopped being paid, which is the one buyers forget — a phone can end up listed without anybody having stolen anything.