My new OS update erased all contents of my phone. Is there any way to recover anything?

[AC Question]

my new OS update erased all contents of my phone. Is there any way to recover anything?

I have an LG Optimus and was recently prompted to install an update. I was given no indication that my hard drive would be erased, yet when the phone restarted, it seemed to have gone to factory default state, erasing all pictures, contacts, downloaded apps and associated accounts.

I have synced 2 google accounts to the phone, but so far have not recovered anything. Do I have any possible recourse for getting data back? It is very troubling to have lost all contact info, pictures and chrome bookmarks/search history.

For reference, The model number is LG LS720 and i currently am running Android 4.1.2 on LS720ZV8.

I have never made a backup of any files on a computer as I do not have my own computer right now. I also am unfamiliar with and wary of syncing everything in the cloud. Any help would be much appreciated, at the very least, perhaps recovery of contacts.

 

[B. Diddy]

Re: my new OS update erased all contents of my phone. Is there any way to recover anything?

Welcome to Android Central! A system update shouldn't trigger a full factory reset, unless something went very wrong. When the phone started up again after the update, did you have to go through the whole setup wizard again, and add your Google account to the phone? That would confirm a factory reset happened.

Prior to the update, were your contacts and calendars associated with your Google account, or were they saving locally to the Phone account? I always recommend people associate these items with their Google account, because it syncs automatically, and keeps their information safe in the cloud, just in case something like this happens. I understand that people may be wary of cloud storage, but those folks should always ask themselves how sensitive that information is. Would it be a horrible thing if my contacts and calendar events got leaked to the public? Not really, so I don't mind syncing that stuff to my Google account. Would it be bad if all of my credit card account numbers and passwords got leaked? Of course, so I don't sync that info to Google--I keep it locally on my phone and on my computer only, in password-protected locations. I also use 2-factor authentication for my Google account, in order to maximize my security.

So if that information was syncing to your Google account, it should sync back to the phone once you log back in. Go to Settings>Accounts-Google, select one of Google accounts, and make sure all of the information you want to sync is checked.

If, however, your data was all local, then it's unfortunately wiped after a factory reset. Sorry!