Does this PDF show where the IMEI number is stored in the SIM card?

Easy, you use a feature phone for voice and the ipod touch for whatever you will do on wifi. That is the only way to go for you if you insist on staying with AT$T.

You can't get ABC with AT&T. You can take the phone to T-mob and drop data, but you don't like T-mob service. Hence the ipod touch plus feature phone.

Unfortunately, this is the free market system. They make up the rules. Feel free to start your own wireless company, then you can create your own plan.

This is why it was so important to keep T-mob and AT$T from merging. T-mob needs your business. AT&T barely gives a crap.

IMEI can be changed and it is not illegal. However, once you commit "theft of services" with the hacked IMEI, expect AT$T legal to be on your case. That is where they shake you down since theft of services is at least a misdemeanor in most states. While that doesn't sound to bad, you can get jail time in theory for a misdemeanor. So they shake you down to avoid criminal penalties, or maybe they just dump you as a customer.

Incidentally, the IMEI is a computer generated number. You have to follow the algorithm. I suppose there is a small chance you will create an IMEI of an existing customer. Now that can get ugly since it now looks like you are spoofing that customer.

This is really a lot of work you are creating for yourself.

No, the IMEI is unique. Who said otherwise?

Here is a thought. People have old phones laying around. If you really insist on hacking your IMEI, make sure you don't spoof a working phone. Just use the IMEI from a phone that is no longer in use. I think the law won't go too psycho with the theft of services by avoiding the AT$T data charger, but cloning a phone is another matter. Potentially your calls could end up on another person's bill. That i believe is serious.

What really sucks is when you get hacked like that, it takes about 20 minutes to get false charges removed, at least from AT$T long distance. I got hacked a few times and finally set up my land line so I have no long distance service. That incidentally cut my bill nearly in half. I just use the cell phone for long distance. T-mob is so damn cheap. I get

1500 anytime minutes for $35 a month. Unlimited data is another $20.

Not really. At best, it's an oligopoly. Besides, the telecommunications companies are (supposedly) regulated.

So, the 'regulators' should have a say in their policies. Or so my thinking goes ...

Or the IMEI can be changed.

Think about the (almost comical) court case:

- User did not use any data & in fact, has a data block on the account

- AT&T added a data plan automatically anyway - but only when the SIM goes into certain types of phones (that list is not provided to the user)

- User repeatedly asks for the data plan to be removed

- AT&T repeatedly removes the data plan

- Yet, AT&T repeatedly adds the data plan for data that can't possibly be used, any time the user sticks the SIM into an unpublished listing of models

This would be a laughable slam dunk, except for the deep pockets of AT&T as compared to that of the owner.

Trivial. You just use the IMEI of any old unused (or other carrier) dumb phone that you own (I have plenty in my drawer).

It's common knowledge that the IMEI is not unique.

Google "imei is not unique" and you'll see.

I just did that and all the hits indicate it is unique unless hacking was involved.

In any event, my suggesting makes perfect sense. Take the IMEI from a phone not in use. What is your problem with that approach? It will save the effort of having to generate a correct IMEI.

I made the suggestion of using an old IMEI.

Regarding the legality, it is all a matter of how much legal power the corporations are willing to spend. How long has the RIAA been hounding that woman for peer to peer music piracy?

If AT$T wants to bitch slap you, they will bitch slap you.

It is far easier simply not to use them. Note if you can't get T-mobile at your house, they have a UMA option. All the Blackberries other than OS7 and most Samsung phones are UMA capable. Some HTC phones can do UMA.

Note the iphone is not capable of UMA. Some people confuse shitty VOIP apps on the iphone for UMA, but it is not the same thing.

I have absolutely no problem with that approach! In fact, it was my plan all along.

BTW, the very first hit on Google, which is this Wikipedia reference, clearly says people who should know report that 10% of all IMEIs are not unique:

"New IMEIs can be programmed into stolen handsets and 10% of IMEIs are not unique." According to a BT Cellnet spokesman quoted by the BBC. [1]

REFERENCE:

Well I don't count the hacked IMEIs. From legit manufacturers, the IMEI should be unique.

T-Mob, being a vendor that supports UMA, probably watches IMEI more than the average wireless company. I assume there is high paranoia at T-mob that some people are spoofing their way onto the network to make calls. When you have UMA issues, you will find it is the black hole of advice from T-mob. They simply don't want to talk about UMA. When you load an OS from a vendor other than T-mob, it is missing a certificate relevant to UMA. When you go on the network, T-Mob puts the certificate on the phone. In my case, they didn't have the IMEI of my phone on file and I wasn't getting the certificate. I had to do a work around to get the certificate to get UMA to finally work. At the time, I didn't know they needed my IMEI.

Best to find a consumer-oriented organization to fund this battle as the consumer is the ultimate winner - but most are sheep - so unless 'someone' fights for consumer rights - consumers get none.

In this case, it's simply the right to not pay for something that you can't use and don't want and can easily block.

You still have the biggest right of all, one that trumps everything else. You have the right to walk away and spend your money somewhere else. Good luck in your quest, though.

[snipppppppp of an eralier discussion]

While cellcos earlier may have, at their option, used or abused, ignored or rang bells, folded, spindled, or mutilated the IMEI from the cellphones, they're now most assuredly going to utilize them in a real-time data base.

Exceprting from a WSJ article a few months ago: [wsj]

The nation's major wireless providers have agreed to a deal with the U.S. government to build a central database of stolen cellphones - part of a broad effort to tame an explosion of thefts nationwide. .... According to an FCC official, the SIM-card problem [a] will likely be solved by the carriers' making an additional check to ensure that the devices themselves are authorized to work on the network, not just the SIM card. .... Similar stolen-phone databases are already in use abroad, including in the U.K., Germany, France and Australia ------------ rest:

[a] the "problem" is that in systems that use SIM cards, prior to this list you could put a new SIM in a stolen phone and it would work.

Yeah, sure. Gotta luv the gullibility. []'s

-- Don't be evil - Google 2004 We have a new policy - Google 2012