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Brazil Blocks Foreign Mobile Phones
First time accepted submitter fabrica64 writes "The Brazilian government has today started blocking mobile phones not sold in Brazil (Portuguese-language original), i.e. not having paid sales taxes here. The blocking is based on IMEI, and if you come to Brazil for the World Cup in June and think of buying a Brazilian SIM card to call locally at lower rates, then it won't work because your mobile's IMEI will be blacklisted as not sold in Brazil. This is not a joke, it's true!"
Now stolen iPhone's from the US will be worth SLIGHTLY less. Because nobody can clone an IMEI...
This is a new low, blatant lies in the summary only for cheap country based hate and some pageviews. Good job!
Should we understand that some of the articles posted on Slashdot are jokes then?
http://www.telecompaper.com/news/brazil-to-introduce-mobile-blocking-system--1002303
Brazilian mobile operators will start testing from 17 March a new system that will block mobile calls made by pirate devices, reports Folha de Sao Paulo. The total blockade of the devices will be effective from September. Until then, during the so-called "pre-operational" stage of the system, equipment must continue to function normally. When an operator identifies a device without approval in Brazil, the system should activate the blockade, for phones as well as tablets.
The new system of the operators compares lists of domestic and foreign records to verify which mobile phones are authentic.
If your phone is flagged as being stolen then it is blocked...
It says that MODELS not sold in Brazil won't work there, not devices. So, for example, iPhones will work because they're sold there. It's been known for a while and the law was designed to avoid low quality, low security Chinese android phones to be sold.
They may be able to boss around the world cup officials but wait til the IOC wields its economic might to force Brazil's hand.
I am becoming gerund, destroyer of verbs.
Are they going to make you strip naked after you get off of the airplane unless you can prove that you paid Brazilian sales tax on your clothes?
I read the internet for the articles.
Will it affect roaming or only sim swaps?
Devices without certification will still work at least until September.
This submission appears to be nonsense posted by someone who hasn't read the article they linked to.
This isn't about blocking phones sold outside of Brazil, but models of phones that are not certified for use in Brazil. So you can take your Nexus 5 or iPhone, but it's probable that some no-name cheapo phones may not work.
The IMEI number contains codes for the manufacturer and model, so you can white-list those models that have certification from the Brazilian FCC.
Paul Leader
Whoosh.
So you go on vacation in Brazil and you either pay international roaming fees or you buy a cheap dumb phone to make local calls. Lame but not too expensive. Furthermore a dump phone needs to be charged once per week or even less frequently.
Btw, are they going to confiscate tourists clothes on entry? They've not been not bought in Brazil, so no sales tax paid there!
The original article actually says that the government will block devices that were not approved by Anatel (Telecommunications Agency) due to many of the smuggled cheap phones and tablets (most of them manufactured in China) have not passed their certification.
Although the idea is good, I think it will cause lots of issues with users with valid and certified devices. Let's wait and see....
In June they will work, the meltdown will start in September, as stated in the article. As far as Anatel homologation goes, I can't remember a major phone brand that does not have it. All Apple, Samsung, LG, etc., they all carry Anatel's (Brazilian FCC) seal.
Actually, the news talks that the government action is to block phones that are not homologated (technicaly certified) by the Brazilian's telecommunications agency (ANATEL, the coutrie's equivalent of the FCC). It doesn't have to do with sales tax and seems to be intented to prevent the use of "pirates" phones, that might cause problems to the telecommunications network or even to the users. For example: if you buy an iPhone in the USA you could use it at Brazil, because this model is homologated by ANATEL. However if you buy an obscure Chinese cell phone (derogatorily called in Brazil as "Xing Ling phones") that was not certified, then you will not be able to connect it to the mobile network.
...this line:
"This is not a joke, it's true!"
This sig no verb.
Brazil is very tight about importing & exporting product. It's worse than Russia and China. I used to work for a global company with an office in Sao Paulo and getting hardware into that country was a nightmare, if not impossible. Customs still has one of our servers that never made it. Buying the same thing locally can end up with taxes costing 100% more than what the product is worth in the USA, if you can even get it at all. The rest of South America is no picnic, but Brazil is the worst.
Just don't go to Brazil for the World Cup in June.
Just another reason not to go to Brazil
1. Being Murdered
2. Kidnap/Hostage
3. Phone Block
Was going to put STDs in there but I wouldn't spend that sort of time with the locals.
And HTC, Acer, Archos... There are a lot of brands not selling in Brazil oficially.
They didn't understand the article at all.
While the automatic translation is far from being optimal, it makes pretty clear that any device, which model is certified by the Brazilian authority, will work, regardless of where it was purchased.
And the sale taxes part is pure speculation.
"First time accepted submitter fabrica64 writes"
I'm curious what fabrica64's failed submissions were. This should of been one of them.
By what I understood, it won't block foreign phones. It will block phones not certified by the telecommunication agency, which means counterfeit phones.
So, this is to prevent cheap Chinese knock-off phones from being usable? Well guess-a-what, most of them already include a helpful utility to set the IMEI to whatever you want. All the fix will be is a couple of lines of whatever the Portuguese equivalent of "Engrish" is called, instructing the buyer:
Much enjoy new DroidPhone Galaxy 5!
For luck of happiness, user set IMEI copy basicphone
Please IMEI set application WRITE IMEI
Excellent signal received all times!
---
DRM is like antifreeze, to the MPAA/RIAA it's sweet, to the consumers it's poison.
ja fudeu, porra
Its not only an issue of taxes. Brazil wants less exposure to unregulated technology entering the country in large part due to the new Stasi at the NSA and British intelligence that are behaving like China (supposedly allies of the countries they've been spying on). Frankly I can hardly blame them. The US and UK used to be good guys. Today their establishment (which is different than average people) are a bunch of unprincipled undemocratic bullies that behave as if they run the world.
"However, these electronics will continue to operate normally until at least September, when the deactivations should actually begin."
So ANY device will work just fine for the world cup in June.
That was in the first paragraph. Could we please start reading the articles before creating summaries for them?
Vetting individual IMEIs is neither practical nor legal, as you can't stop someone from using a government approved, legally imported phone from using it on all networks.
You're wrong. It's both feasible and, in many countries, legal.
Turkey already does this. If you use a foreign phone of any kind with a Turkish SIM, your individual IMEI will be blocked in 24-48 hours. The only way around that is to pay a significant fee to the government, register your phone/IMEI, and then wait a week or so for the registration to take effect. Note that you can't register AFTER the phone is blocked. If you let it get blocked, you're basically screwed.
Turkey does this to prevent the importation of phones that didn't pay local taxes, and also to ensure that all users of phones/data are registered and tracked within the country.
GeekNights!
Late Night Radio for Geeks!
This is utter bullshit. Total crap. Total misunderstood of the original text. I'm living there so I know.
Brazil have a bunch of phones sold here coming from China, unfortunately these are not passing the Anatel label (equivalent of the US FCC) which is mandatory for usage in any Brazil carrier (just like in US). In fact they did not pass any label in whatever countries.
What they want is to make sure these pirated/copied devices do not sell here and are not used in Brazil. Why? Because people come and complain to the operators that the phone doesn't work and in many cases it's like a copy (bad) of say Galaxy S3. The thing did not even pass any kind of certification, is buggy as hell and then operators need to deal with bad PR when it's not their fault.
IMEI are unique in the world, it's easy for Anatel to incorporate databases from other countries and that's what they will do to make sure properly acquired phones are whitelisted. Do not worry if you bought an official phone wherever it was it's going to be ok. They just want to make sure the phones used in the Brazilian networks did pass certifications (E.U, FCC or whatever else) and get rid of pirated crap.
That's all. My gosh.
It may be true, but it is nonetheless a joke.
Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.
"Porém, esses eletrônicos vão continuar a funcionar normalmente pelo menos até setembro, quando as desativações devem efetivamente começar."
Apparently someone doesn't know how to read Portuguese (or at least use google translate). The above is from the original article that apparently wasn't read by the person that posted this. Your devices will work fine by exchanging SIMs through September of this year. Which us AFTER the World Cup is over.
What the brazilian agency says it wants is to block unapproved phones that harm the telco's network. If a device is illegal and known to do harm on the network, i'd say its ok to block it. Now, the part the sucks on the regulation is that allowing or not a device on the network will be done using a whitelist of models. So, if you buy a brand new Google Nexus 6 on the launch date and travel to Brazil on the next day, it wont work. IMHO, they should use a black list and block devices that are KNOWN to harm the network.
The official policy is that if a device is FCC-certified or ETSI-certified, it WILL NOT be blocked.
http://macmagazine.com.br/2014...
Dear aunt, let's set so double the killer delete select all
Anyone who bothered to check the local Gizmodo article about it (http://gizmodo.uol.com.br/anatel-bloquear-celulares-piratas/) would know that:
1) Any models approved by ANATEL or "international organizations from countries with whom Brazil has good commercial relationship" won't be blocked.
2) No rules regarding imported phones were defined yet.
3) It will not affect anyone who is already using a "banned" phone.
Turkey has been doing this for a while. Money hungry pricks.
http://translate.google.com/#pt/en/http%3A%2F%2Fwww.anatel.gov.br%2FPortal%2FexibirPortalNoticias.do%3Facao%3DcarregaNoticia%26codigo%3D32941
Original in Portuguese: http://www.anatel.gov.br/Portal/exibirPortalNoticias.do?acao=carregaNoticia&codigo=32941
They just want to make sure the phones used in the Brazilian networks did pass certifications (E.U, FCC or whatever else)
Others claim it means the carrier will say "This model has passed FCC certification but, unfortunately for you, not Anatel. No service for you." What in the article rules out that interpretation?
and get rid of pirated crap.
Apple has maintained, and a U.S. court has agreed, that Android phones made by Samsung are pirated.
nobody in the government here would want such a major embarassment
What could ever go wrong? It's not like such a highly organized mass technocratic ideosyncracy could ever fail, misplace or mangle a authorization. Nor would something that only happens in backward theocracies - like a stuxnet - *ever* happen there. Everyone can count on being perfectly safe, happy and healthy. :-) Wealthy and wise, too. No unexpected blackouts in country that has more cellphones than people. Trust them.
You can't get a Brazilian SIM anyway card without a CPF (basically a Brazilian Social Security Number).
...not that it was really at the top of my list anyway. But seriously? They expect you to buy a new phone just to visit/travel there? That's going to be a serious problem for a lot of people. It's almost as though they want you stay out.
Downmodding is the refuge of the weak. Don't downmod, make a better argument!