U.S. Carriers Agree to Deny Service to Stolen Phones
Under the new system, a stolen phone wouldn't work on any network.
Smartphones these days are expensive pieces of equipment, which makes them attractive targets for thieves. However, if a new shared database from major U.S. carriers is successful, the market for stolen cell phones is about to get a whole lot smaller.
Bloomberg reports that AT&T, T-Mobile, Sprint, and Verizon have teamed up with the FCC to launch a new stolen phone database. The database will contain serial numbers of all phones reported stolen and the four major carriers have agreed to deny service to any handset that turns up in the database.
Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski said that carriers are prepared to start blocking service to stolen phones within six months. They hope that this new system will discourage cell phone thieves as well as protect victims' data.

chances are thats where a lot of stolen phones are getting sold.
However, thieves would just sell the phone, so this is nice to stop them.
Plus, I gain a little faith in "the system" back every time I see big companies willing to work together, even IF it's for a common benefit. It happens once in a blue moon...
I think the way it would be likely to work is that when you first activate your new phone, the carrier would collect the serial number - it has to be accessible through software for them to even be able to block a stolen phone. Then, if your phone gets stolen, they already know what the serial number for it was, so that serial number would be moved into the database of inoperable serial numbers.
The best thieves may find a way to change the serial numbers, but it would probably be an effective deterrent for the common thief.
I am from Israel and we had this policy for years now..
chances are thats where a lot of stolen phones are getting sold.
Well this serial number is hardcoded in hardware. On most phones you can check it out by dialing *#06#. Every phone has it. And you got the wrong impression that carriers would block the phone, no they just block service to the phone which means you won't get signal on stolen phone.
This system will discourage the thieves only up to some extent because these stolen phones still be fully operable outside US.
New system will emerge for thieves, phones stolen in US will be exported to Canada and phones stolen in canada will be exported to US.
The question i have.. Is what is going to stop people from just swapping the Sim into their stolen device and never updating the serial # in the system? This was very very common with non smart phones swapping to smart phones to avoid the mandatory data plans. I know for certain the cell towers show the Imei and serial number in use... So assuming they are going to implement something in the software to block the phone if the serial number matches in the database?
Agree with the rest of you on needing a public access. Sure would suck to buy a new phone on ebay/craigslist only to find out it's useless.
Thats a good point. Also people are still going to steal them for having a glorified ipod as well
But im sure they could all do this before. Maybe the government gave them an incentive to make this alliance, and database.