Losing an iPhone can affect your business; disrupt your workflow by not having access to email and phones thus making your life difficult. Hence it is advisable to set up apps to electronically track your handset. There are several free tracker apps in the market that help to find a stolen phone.
Biggest problem of stolen iPhone
Find My iPhone app is a cloud based service by Apple, used to track Apple devices iPhone, iPad or iPod Touch. It has Lost Mode option that not only tracks the location of the device but also tracks where all it has been taken. This would help one to decide their next course of action. The application helps to send a message to the lost device, with a contact number. Anyone who finds it can call back at the number from the Lock Screen without having to unlock the handset. Find My iPhone App cannot be turned off or erased from the device. It is actually inbuilt in iOS7 or its later versions. This is possible by a feature called Activation Lock which prevents anyone accessing the OS without the Apple ID password. iCloud can help find the lost iPhone. One needs to sign up to iColud.com to track the iPhone. This option can only be used in case of the availability of iCloud Services. ‘If Found Lock Screen’ is another app for iPhone which allows messages to be added to your locked screen wallpaper. People generally update the screen with their contact details, so that once lost, they can be contacted by the person who finds it. The app has features of customizing the screen.
iHound is another mobile tracking and security service which has an iOS or Android app component. It has a simple app interface displaying your current location on a map through GPS. MobiWee is another free mobile tracker similar to ‘Find My iPhone’ app. It is more than a mobile locating app and works on iPhone, Android, Windows Mobile and Blackberry handsets. In addition to tracking, it has a feature of retrieving data from the lost handset and also has the option of shutting down the device from any web browser. This app is only available for corporate users. Similarly, iLocalis allows one to log in to the website and track the missing handset by sending a message to the lost iPhone. This works even for mobiles whose SIM cards have been removed. One can also get the, new phone number of the iPhone with the help of iLocalis. Mobile Defense is another such app to track lost Android Smartphones. Remote locking of the handset can be done with Mobile Defense once the lost devise is tracked. Glympse is another cell phone tracking system but it can only work on GPS enabled devices.
Mobile Apps like Hidden, GadgetTrak, Device Tracker and Prey are third party apps and work on Significant Location Change services which are built into the operating system. But these services only update location data for the app when it is moving.
The above tracking methods are only valid in case the mobile has a working internet connection. The mobile cannot be accessed in case it is in the airplane mode; the phone is off or has no data connection since it cannot send back any location data to the internet. Once an iPhone is erased it is impossible to locate it. It is also not possible to track it without an iCloud or a Google account.
Though there are several high tech apps available in the market today but they work under some assumptions. Basic conditions like an internet connection or the enabling of certain features is a must to avail these apps. So in case of lost mobile the last option should be to report to the police!