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Cloned Cellular Phones |
axxxr
Joined: Mar 21, 2003
Posts: > 500
From: Londinium
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The Korean government said it is technically possible to trace cell phone owners by cloning their gadgets without their knowledge.
In a report to the National Assembly on Tuesday, the Ministry of Information and Communication (MIC) confirmed the fact and said it had detected a total of 1,940 cloned phones since last November.
This stirs up disputes in connection with the Find-Friend service, a location-based service (LBS) provided by the nation's mobile operators.
Under the Find-Friend service, a handset user's location is known to pre-registered friends by identifying geographic coordinates of the base station through which the cell phone communicates.
Earlier last month, unionists of Samsung SDI, the display making affiliate of Samsung Group, accused the firm of tracking their locations via the LBS. Police are currently investigating the situation.
According to the MIC, cloned cell phones might help unscrupulous persons register themselves as a friend of a targeted phone owner to trace his whereabouts.
Every cell phone has a unique factory-set electronic serial number (ESN) and a cloned phone is one illegally programmed to have the identical ESN to the legitimate phone.
After cloning, both the legitimate and the fraudulent phones have the same ESN and phone number, and cellular systems cannot distinguish the cloned cell phone from the legitimate one.
This enabled the start of the LBS, which was possible only after being explicitly agreed to by legitimate phone owners. Fraudulent phone holders are able to give their consent to mobile operators using their devices.
``The ESN is a minimum-must to clone cell phones. We are trying to learn how the secret source of the hard-to-reach information was leaked,'' an MIC official said.
Currently, secret acquisition of the ESN is an almost impossible task, as only a few selected mobile operators and cell phone makers can access it under strict monitoring, he added.
However, the cell phone cloning continues even after the ministry took strict measures to bar the leakage of the ESN and started to crack down on the cloned phones from last November.
A total of 1,097 cloned phones were discovered last year and the figure reached 843 this year alone, including 30 for last month, the MIC said.
The ESN is a unique identification number embedded or inscribed on the microchip in a cell phone by the manufacturers.
Each time a call is placed, the ESN is automatically transmitted to the based station so the wireless carrier's mobile switching office can check the call's validity.
Via: Koreatimes
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Dragonfly_TP
Joined: Aug 11, 2004
Posts: > 500
From: Belgium
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unless your network profider doesn't do it's job, this might be possible.
But: a sim can't be coppied. It is protected. As soon as you try to copy the protected part of the memory, the sim will deactivate/terminate (electronic read out protection)
If 2 identical sims are active on the network, it will conflict and both sims will be deactivated/barred
For questions please send me a private message.
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[ This Message was edited by: Dragonfly_TP on 2004-08-20 12:29 ] |
mr. superman
Joined: Mar 16, 2004
Posts: 32
From: philippines
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tnx for the info mate...im just curious, how did you get your nice and unique avatar?
SUPERMAN17 BEFORE..... |
Elrond
Joined: May 14, 2003
Posts: > 500
From: Slovakia
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axxxr is the official Esato news editor, so he has a unique avatar.
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Access the forum with a mobile phone via esato.mobi
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Posted: 2004-08-20 13:15
K750i, Nokia 6120c and a HP iPAQ hx4700 
