schoflyer

Hello All:

Woe is me!

My iPhone (AT&T) was last seen/used on the Airport Express in HKG. Then Poof! I realized it was gone before I left the station, but the train was gone to and Lost and Found has been of no help. Let me provide some details and maybe the ensuing discussion could provide some help for the community in general.

Let's not even mention MobileMe other than to say that I wish I had it! I didn't but am considering it among my options for the future.

Now just to complicate things a bit personal use of my iPhone is not allowed. So depending on how you look at it, I guess I'm lucky to have one iPhone left in my possession.

ON BOTH Phones, My calendars, contacts, and mail all sync to google/google apps. As far as I can tell, no data has been "Lost". Only privacy has been lost.

I immediately disabled my SIM with a call to AT&T.
The passcode lock feature was not enabled on the lost handset.
I immediately changed my google passwords which I suppose eliminates further syncing.

I'm not an app freak and I rarely ask the iPhone to remember passwords.
I see my exposure here to be minimal. Auto-Login Sling, Twitter, BeeJive, Skype.I've updated my skype password. Haven't gotten around to the other yet. Will do this week.

Another interesting bit of news is that when I plugged in my business iPhone which syncs to the same iTunes account. I received a message that the computer I was on was no longer authorized. Would this have anything to do with something that the individual in possession of my other phone would have done? The videos that were to be removed were purchased on the other handset.

I suppose MobileMe is a solution for the future. Other apps/options seem to needs a jailbreak. Am I missing something here?

It's not about the money I'll need to drop on the new 32GB 3GS or missing data/songs/etc. I'm resigned to that. The question is more what to do differently both in terms of setup and in event of disaster.

Thanks for your input. I appreciate it.

Scho

sbm12

Sorry to hear you lost the device.

Enable the password security. And use a device that supports remote wiping and other security features. Not much help if you insist on an iPhone (though there might be an app for that ) but it is one of the reasons I really like my BB. Knowing that I can remotely wipe it is rather comforting to me.

JClishe

And also a comfort factor with Windows Mobile devices as well. If your company has an Exchange server that you use your WM phone with, you can remotely wipe it yourself from OWA. Or if your company doesn't have Exchange, you can use the free Microsoft MyPhone service to remotely wipe your phone. With MyPhone you can also ring your phone if you lose it; Even if it's set to vibrate, MyPhone will force a ring.

Weez_1000

I know you said dont mention mobileme but thats exactly what you should do differently. It not only tells you where your phone is (location) but enables remote wipe. Thats assuming you go for another iphone.

wiredboy10003

The single most important thing on the phone is to use password security. After ten tries it will delete all the data on the phone. Then you can restore it later if you find the phone.

Mobile Me allows for remote wiping of the phone, but I think it still has to have the original SIM card in the phone. I guess that's an advantage of devices that don't use SIM cards.

It's cold comfort, but whoever stole your phone probably isn't too interested in your contact list or calendar. They'll quickly wipe it, unlock (or jailbreak) it and sell it.

http://www.apple.com/mobileme/whats-new/

schoflyer

Yes, I know I said not to mention Mobile Me but that's only because it is the obvious solution.

Seems to be the best coupled with the passcode feature.

Through my research yesterday the main shortcoming of MM is that if the person in possession of the handset yanks the SIM or disables your MM resident push email account you're out of luck.

The passcode feature seemingly guards against disable leaving the SIM yank as the obvious security hole.

Will be signing up for MM today. Should have done it yesterday but didn't have my CC with me at the pool in BKK

Actually should have done it when the feature was made available ;(

FLYMSY

Did you try to call your number before you contacted AT&T? Maybe you might have lucked out that an honest person found it.

JohnnySegal

thanks to this thread I now know about mobileme an investment that does sound well worth its weight. I also agree with flymsy, you just might have gotten lucky and found an honest person.

SkyTeam777

I read elsewhere that if your iphone is stolen there is no way to get a new one without waiting 6 months when one can upgrade their contract again. Is this true? Im sure it depends on who the contract is with, but I use AT&T and just got the phone last month. Can I not buy a new iphone for the same subsidized price I paid before? or at least add something new to my contract so that I can qualify?

FLYMSY

http://www.electricpig.co.uk/2008/12...with-mobileme/

http://www.macworld.com/article/1413..._iphonecentral

Many other stories on the web.

schoflyer

You can get a new one but not at the subsidized price.
My 32GB 3gs will come with 699 SPG *points;(

Dubai Stu

You also can't insure an iPhone with ATT, but you can insure a Blackberry. If you need a cheap smartphone, take a look at the Nokia E63. They can be had new for $150 and are very powerful.

willyroo

And they have a very simple remote lock via SMS...

dtsm

Unfortunately you're right. If you don't enable passcode feature, easy to disable mobile wipe feature. And of course, leaving push sucks up battery life like no other!

All in all, not a great solution.....best to purchase an encrypted password app to store confidential things and cross your fingers

jackal

Actually, push can save you battery life. It depends on the volume of mail you get.

A family member actually gets longer battery life by enabling push and changing the fetch to 1-hour intervals instead of disabling push and fetching every 15 minutes.

Why?

The family member doesn't get many emails (it's a low-volume personal account). Fetching every 15 minutes results in 96 mail-checks per day. Conversely, assuming the family member receives 5 emails per day (and even that's sometimes generous), using the push + 1 hour strategy means the mail is only being checked 29 times per day. (It would actually be possible to turn fetching off completely, in which case the email account would be checked 5 times per day, whenever it receives a push notification of a new email, but with the Exchange ActiveSync technology not being perfectly reliable, I'm much more comfortable with a backup of once-an-hour checking to keep the ActiveSync connection alive or re-establish it if it closes.)

It doesn't sound like much, but it has a noticeable effect on battery life. A push-only account with fetch turned completely off that never receives any email should have a completely negligible effect on battery life. The tiny heartbeat that keeps the connection alive (every, what, 20 minutes or so?) is so small--just a few IP packets--that it probably doesn't even register as a single percentage point of the battery's life over the course of a day. A push account only uses more power when it receives an email.

Conversely, push on my phone actually eats up more battery life, because I receive about 60 emails per day on my push account, PLUS I have the phone set to fetch every 15 minutes (for my non-push accounts, of which I have 7). That means my phone is checking mail 828 times per day. Even then, left untouched, it still only eats through about 20-30% of the battery in a day, but combined with my actual (nearly constant) use, I usually end the day with about 20% of the battery remaining. If I turned push off, I'd see 60 fewer mail checks (which isn't much less).

Someone who receives several hundred emails per day on their push account could see their battery meter draining before their eyes.

But the act of enabling push in and of itself does not eat up more power. It's dependent on your other settings (whether you can lower your fetch interval) and how many emails you get on the push account.