If a phone is on the negative list, it cannot be activated. The only way was if it was your phone that was lost, and you've found it later. What you have to do is go to a service repair center and have them take it off the list or e-mail to their Repair Rep saying that the customer found their phone. I haven't looked into the cloning system, but if it works, okay, but you can never take the phone into a Sprint store, because we are suppose to take any lost or stolen unit and give it back to the owner.