October 17, 2024
Phones contain so much of our digital life — emails, social media and bank accounts, images, chat messages, and so on — that if they are stolen or go missing, it may cause significant disruption beyond the loss of a device.
Phone thefts have become so common in certain areas that crooks on electric bikes steal them from pedestrians, swipe them from restaurant tables, and pickpocket them on the metro.
In Britain, where 200 phones are taken every day in \"snatch thefts,\" the government has promised to tighten down on the crime and is meeting with internet companies and gadget makers to devise answers.
Here are the actions you may take before and after your phone goes lost.
Basic safeguards -
There are steps you may take to make it less unpleasant if your phone is stolen. People frequently ignore some of these qualities due to their technical nature.
Lock down as much as possible. To unlock the device, at the very least, enter a password or perform a biometric scan. You may also set similar criteria to key individual applications, such as your bank account, WhatsApp, or Signal, to secure your finances or conversations from criminals.
Also, enable the Find My Device function, which is accessible on both iOS and Android. Samsung also provides its own service, SmartThings Find.
You\'ll undoubtedly have a lot of important images stored on your camera roll. It\'s a good idea to back up your contacts, calendar entries, and other information. Google and Apple provide cloud-based backup services, however the free versions have limited storage capacity. You may also back up your data to an external hard drive, memory card, or laptop. Some police departments and phone providers recommend turning off message previews to prevent criminals from viewing reset or login codes when the phone is locked. To activate this on an iPhone, navigate to the Notifications section of the Settings menu and select Show Previews. You may also go down the app list to disable previews for certain applications while leaving them enabled for less hazardous ones like as news or weather.
Turn on the latest features. -
Recent iOS and Android versions offer a number of new features aimed at making theft less appealing.
iPhone owners may enable Stolen Device Protection, which makes it far more difficult for phone thieves to access crucial services and settings. Many criminals may want to delete the data and reset the device in order to resell it, but with this option enabled, they will need to scan their face or fingerprints. Apple has recently improved its \"activation lock\" function, making it more difficult for criminals to sell parts from stolen phones.
Meanwhile, Android phones may now employ artificial intelligence to detect motion, signaling that someone has taken it from your hand and is fleeing on foot or by bike, and promptly lock the screen. Private Spaces is a function that allows you to conceal important data on your phone.
Jot down your device number –
Take note of your phone\'s serial number, often known as the IMEI number. It can connect you to the phone if it is ultimately retrieved. Call it by entering (asterisk)#06# onto your phone\'s keypad. If you have already misplaced your phone, you can look for it in other areas, such as the box it arrived in.
If it is stolen. -
If your phone is taken, inform the police. If your insurance policy includes coverage for the gadget, contact your provider. Inform your phone carrier so that they can freeze your number and get you a replacement SIM card or eSIM. Notify your bank so that they can monitor for unusual transactions.
Tracking Your Device -
Attempt to locate your phone using the find my device function. For iPhones, navigate to iCloud.com/find from a web browser, while Android users should visit www.google.com/android/find. Samsung also offers its own service for Galaxy smartphones.
These services will display your phone\'s current or last known position on a map, which is useful if you\'ve just misplaced it elsewhere in the home. Apple claims that even if a phone can\'t connect to the internet or has been switched off, it can use Bluetooth to ping any nearby Apple devices on the same network as its AirTags tracking devices. Google claims that newer Pixel phones may be tracked \"for several hours\" after they have been shut off using similar technologies.
You can get the phone to play a sound even if it is set to quiet. You may also set the phone to lost mode, which locks it and shows a message and contact information on the screen to anybody who discovers it. Lost mode on iOS suspends all Apple Pay cards and passes.
If the gadget appears on the map in an unknown region and you fear it has been stolen, experts recommend notifying authorities rather than attempting to recover it yourself.
Final Steps -
If you can\'t find your phone, there are a few last actions to do.
Log out of any accounts that may be accessible on your phone, and then delete it from your list of trusted devices used to obtain multifactor authentication codes – but make sure you can obtain those codes elsewhere, such as by email.
Finally, as a last option, you may remotely delete the phone, ensuring that no data falls into the wrong hands. Take note, however, that if the iPhone is offline, the remote delete will not take effect until it is back online. However, if you discover the phone before it is wiped, you can revoke the request.
Google advises that SD memory cards used onto Android phones may not be remotely deleted. And after the phone has been cleaned, it will not appear in Find My Device.