This is absolute nonsense PICHARDO, it's supposedly to prevent stolen phones being used, but any self-respectable "taller" can wipe IMEI (ILLEGAL) but anyone worth his salt as cellphone repairman can do that. Once the stolen phone has a wiped and new IMEI it's like a new phone.
CEIR is a database of mobile equipment identifiers (IMEI – for networks of GSM standard, MEID – for networks of CDMA standard). Such an identifier is assigned to each SIM slot of the mobile device.
Lists of IMEIs may be the:
White – for devices that are allowed to register in the cellular network,
Black – for devices that are prohibited to register in the cellular network,
Grey – for devices in intermediate status (when it is not yet defined in which of the lists - black or white - the device should be placed).
In each country, the CEIR can interact with IMEI DB differently.
Firstly, it is separately decided whether CEIR will send information about its blacklist to IMEI DB (which IMEIs are placed in it or removed from there).
Secondly, upon receipt of the blacklist from IMEI DB, the regulator decides from which countries it will receive it (IMEI DB stores the information exactly who blacklisted the IMEI). For example, you can get a list from neighboring countries, from countries in your region, from around the world.
In addition to the blacklist, the GSMA is developing a list of IMEIs allocated to manufacturers for use in their devices.
The manufacturer for each new device model gets at least one TAC (Type Allocation Code) allocated by GSMA, consisting of 8 digits, to which he can add a 6-digit serial number to obtain the IMEI. Thus, with one TAC, a manufacturer can release up to 1 million devices with a unique IMEI. Usually, CEIR receives a list of allocated TACs from the GSMA, since if the first 8 digits of the IMEI of a device are not in this list, this is a sign that it is counterfeit.
Those that go the illegal way and use altered IMEI serials, will be detected as the serial will not match the model and series of the cell phone it was imprinted on.
Since they needed to use their pic and legit documents, atop the traceable cell number assigned to that IMEI, they will be questioned by police on that and may be charged as well.
Because a legit model and serial may be used in some cases of altered IMEI, it takes just a bit longer to detect duality of use in another non DR service provider and the same action taken by authorities.
This is what they did when cell phones used to be cloned back in the days...