What does it mean if an iPhone has a bad ESN and can I buy it?

My iPhone 5s was stolen and Verizon as usual is not taking any pity from anyone nor would they offer me a replacement at a discount so if I want the replacement I would have to buy it at full price. I looked online on ebay and saw some iPhone 5s that were really cheap selling but when I look it says bad ESN. I read somewhere that you can't activate this with your provider is that is the case. Is this true and what exactly is bad ESN on an iPhone?

Why should they offer you a discount? Are they responsible for your phone getting stolen?

Anyway, an ESN is a unique identifier to a phone. If the phone was stolen, and someone tries to activate it, it won't work. I suppose people can hack it or something, but if you take a phone that was reported stolen to Gamestop and try to sell it, or to ATT and try to activate it, they won't touch it.

If someone never bothered paying their bill, the ESN may be reported as bad also. In other words, don't buy a phone with a bad ESN. They are good for parts.

It is true, if you buy an iPhone with bad esn you can't activate the phone with the carrier the phone was bought from in this case is Verizon so there's no way the phone can be activated unless the original owner reports the phone as found and continues to pay their 2 year plan if they actually had it… I hear some people are flashing iPhones to work with carriers such as cricket and h2o but not to sure about that but in the good side of this an iPhone with bad esn is not always useless, you can use the phone lile an iPod touch and download apps and music and everything an iPhone will do so don't be too sad about your iPhone having a bad esn

A bad ESN means that the phone was reported lost, stolen or the bill was never paid on the phone. So the people that are selling phones with bad ESN more than likely stole the phone from someone and are selling them on E-Bay.

You can't activate any phone from any company with a bad ESN. Phones with bad ESN numbers are generally sold to provide replacement parts for broken phones.

A bad ESN means that the phone is stolen and has been disabled in consequence. Buying a stolen phone is a felony in some jurisdictions, and you can't get a phone with a bad ESN to work, anyway, so beware.