Comments on: UK Gov tackle mobile theft with txt spk http://www.mobileindustryreview.com/2007/06/uk_gov_tackle_mobile_theft_with_txt_spk.html Daily news and opinion for 250,000 industry executives and mobile fanatics Wed, 10 Feb 2010 02:15:33 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.1 hourly 1 By: John http://www.mobileindustryreview.com/2007/06/uk_gov_tackle_mobile_theft_with_txt_spk.html/comment-page-1#comment-62843 John Sat, 23 Jun 2007 09:04:38 +0000 http://www.smstextnews.com/2007/06/uk_gov_tackle_mobile_theft_with_txt_spk.html#comment-62843 Mike is right, if the government really want to tackle the problem of phone crime they should strenghten the current legislation and make the export of blocked handsets illegal. They should also stop retailers from laundering stolen handsets, by this I mean its possible to take a stolen phone into a retail store and use it as part exchange for a new handset or some will even give you cash back, they never bother to check the Police database of stolen handsets or the blacklist! Mike is right, if the government really want to tackle the problem of phone crime they should strenghten the current legislation and make the export of blocked handsets illegal.
They should also stop retailers from laundering stolen handsets, by this I mean its possible to take a stolen phone into a retail store and use it as part exchange for a new handset or some will even give you cash back, they never bother to check the Police database of stolen handsets or the blacklist!

]]> By: Mike http://www.mobileindustryreview.com/2007/06/uk_gov_tackle_mobile_theft_with_txt_spk.html/comment-page-1#comment-62597 Mike Fri, 22 Jun 2007 18:34:39 +0000 http://www.smstextnews.com/2007/06/uk_gov_tackle_mobile_theft_with_txt_spk.html#comment-62597 This is all well & good, assuming the handsets are being stolen to resell in the UK.

Fact is, most stolen handsets end up in the developing world, where less-than-scrupulous MNO’s don’t impliment blacklists of stolen handset IMEI’s. Some networks in places like Pakistan have a massive proportion of their handsets sourced from Europe, so there’s a real incentive not to block obviously foreign handsets from thier networks.

This move will simply put off the small minority of kids who aren’t stealing to order for international cartels.

Put it this way: It’s profitable for a UK person to legally buy a prepay handset at £100 and post it to Pakistan, where it sells for twice that. The industry calls this ‘box breaking’, and it’s a massive problem. It’s not actually illegal in the UK. Some estimates put 25% of prepay handset sales down to box breakers. That’s handset subsidy the MNO’s will never see back in the form of call revenue.

So long as handsets are subsidised by UK operators, but end up used overseas with foreign MNO sim’s, there will be a financial imperitive to nick them.

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