I lost my Droid

[Herc130]

I was at work and was going out to eat. I was wearing a work shirt top and my droid was in that shirts top pocket. I take my droid out of that pocket and put it on top of my car so that I could remove my shirt without the droid falling out........

After getting some food and just about back to work, I realized what I had done........I never took the Droid off the top of my roof. I tried driving back and forth over the start of my drive looking for the droid. I tried calling it with someone elses cell phone while doing that. I could not find it. I am past that. Someone will eventually find it, weather that gets back to me, I dunno.

I went on My Verizon and turned off my subscription. I do not have insurance.....normally I am very good with small electronics. I rarely have any break on me from miss-use and I till now I never dropped or lost one. Replacement was $559, but Verizon gave it to me for $369. I have had my old droid since the first week of release and it was perfect. Mine never had problems. Hopefully I can say the same for the next one.


I am concerned about the memory card still in my old droid. I guess the sim card or whatever won't get turned back on to my account anymore so they can't surf to my saved web pages which include banking, emails and amazon and other online stores? I went ahead and changed all my passwords on those sites. Should I also change passwords on forum sites as well?

Really wish we had a finger print scanner on the smart phones, lots of info I store on that thing that can be harmful when I lose it. Honestly, I am more concerned about people accessing my memory card then the replacement cost.

 

[SMJUCmoose]

Holy crap. Sorry to hear that man. I am brand new to the droid device but i know blackberrys had a remote wipe feature that you could install.

 

[Hoagie5252]

I don't think anyone would care about your forum log ins up to you.

 

[pops.comp]

Sorry for your loss.. RIP

Holy crap. Sorry to hear that man. I am brand new to the droid device but i know blackberrys had a remote wipe feature that you could install.

There are apps that can let you do that, there are even ones that have GPS functions to locate lost/stolen phones, would have been useful to the OP, too late now

 

[AllGood]

Take a look at WaveSecure. It will allow you to track your droid with the GPS and also give you the ability to remotely wipe the SD card.

 

[PJnc284]

yeah I have gps tracker and wavesecure (got it for free when it was in beta) installed. Set off the alarm through Wavesecure in the office a while back and no one knew what the heck was going on. haha

 

[pops.comp]

yeah I have gps tracker and wavesecure (got it for free when it was in beta) installed. Set off the alarm through Wavesecure in the office a while back and no one knew what the heck was going on. haha

I picked up WaveSecure in beta too, but I also use Lookout, ever since AC had that article about the thief getting caught readhanded..

Backup app helps catch Droid thief | Android Central

That and Lookout scans apps to make sure they are safe (although Im not sure if its effective, because so far they are all safe)

 

[Herc130]

I didn't install any apps for locating it by GPS if lost. Verizon told me they couldn't do it on their end since I didn't set it up with GPS location for friends and family. Lots of people I work with jog up and down the road it probably fell off at, hopefully one of them will find it.

Will the app actually locate the phone via google map on a computer? Or does it just set off the ringer? I diffinently will be installing that on my next droid. Also went ahead with insurance....although ...really, I am not paying horribly more then what the deductable + monthly fee's up to this point would have cost for my new droid.

I don't really keep too much on the phone and already changed passwords on all $$ things. Just have forum passwords to change now. That remote wipe would be great lol. Wish I woulda kept more up on droid matters. I was able to call my phone fine if that's any indication that it still works. If the app to find it was there, I probably could find it and continue using it. Kinda was heavily into apps when I first got the phone, but after a while I just used it as a regular phone that I can surf the internet with and listen to pandora. Stopped looking for the latest apps since I rarely used any apps.

 

[borgey401]

ugh that sucks man. they should have some sort of security feature on these smart phones when they have such personal info on it. that info in the wrong hands can def mess stuff up bad. well good luck to you with your new droid

 

[bnob99]

Another app to take a look at is Mobile Defense. It will locate your device and display the location on google maps. It will also allow you to remote lock or wipe your device. Best part is, its free currently.

 

[DeeMat]

Sorry to hear that. I have been using Mobile Defense and am happy with what it does and how it works. I have heard good things about Wave Secure but did not have a good feeling about it. The hardest thing is for you to get your piece of mind back. Good luck recovering from losing your robot.

 

[PJnc284]

hmm...looks like wavesecure may still be free until march 31st. https://www.wavesecure.com/default.aspx

It allows you to remotely lock your device and sound an alarm, provides location data via google maps which is insanely accurate (just did it inside my house and it tracked me down to within about 500ft) and allows remote wipe. It also provides remote backup of sms, call logs, and contacts. You can backup media from the phone itself but I haven't found a way to do it from the website. For GSM users, it'll even track what sim card is in the phone.

 

[mcgeorge36]

I got in on wavesecure in January, and it was definitely worth it. While I haven't had to use it yet, just knowing I have it is good enough. Plus, they just added an update where you cannot uninstall wavesecure without your pin. Just made a good product even better.

 

[Herc130]

So which is better, Wavesecure or Mobile Defense? I get my new droid today unless Fedex delivers to the wrong place because Verizon are sending it to an incomplete address even after I made several attempts to have them correct it.

I mean, seriously, I send them an email informing them that this address is incorrect:

"7-18" that it needs to be "7-1889" (mAKING IT UP) and that they need to include my apartment number (yes, I told em the correct address and had them repeat it to me when I ordered)

Their response was according to their order entry they sent it to the correct address and they repeated the incorrect address. I tell em they were wrong from the beginning and I am pretty sure I know what my address is reguardless of what the order entry says.

Then they reply they are sorry. That was all. Didn't address the problem, didn't try to fix it, just a we are sorry. No explanation of why they are not able to fix it, nadda. Just a we are sorry. That was 6 emails to get to that point, 4 of which was just to tell em wrong address because they didn't understand that it doesn't matter that the address on the shipment matches the address on the order submission, it's still the wrong address.

Let me guess, their email "customer support" team is from some other country and are completely unable to do anything then tell you what you already know and say they are sorry. They should just completey get rid of customer support like that. At least it won't waste my time before I releaze they are just there to give the appearance of support and farther piss me off then I already am.

 

[prometheus]

Was the device locked with an unlock pattern? That might be enough of a deterrent to any potential thief. Verizon killed the phone's ability to make our receive calls the battery will die out soon if they don't have a mini usb charger. So, someone may just have found a paperweight.

Unless whoever finds it knows that there is a removable card, it's probably in a trash can already. Also, if someone removed the card, they would probably only want it for their own storage. They'd most likely look on the card, see a bunch of pictures and music... Erase it and reuse it themselves without ever going to the extreme effort and energy required to extract web activity and any potential identity theft stuff.

I'm not trying to discount the loss and turmoil this has caused. I just don't think there's much security risk here.

By the way, let's assume a good and honest person finds the phone. It might be very difficult for them to return it to you. How would they find you? One thing I do with mine is tape a small piece of paper inside the battery cover with a note saying, "cash reward if returned" with email and contact info. That way, it might get returned if found. I also put a qr code in there. If the code is scanned it is plain text thanking them for being cool and returning my phone to me. I think if a geek finds the phone, sees a qr code, knows what it is, scans it, reads an impassioned plea to return my baby.... Well, it might work.

So, tracking apps are good, remote wipes are good. But, I might suggest on your new device - tape contact info inside the battery cover. Low tech, old school, free.

 

[Argodabar]

I have Lookout installed. It wiill allow you to go to their site and find your phone using GPS. The only bad thing is that GPS has to be turned on for it to work properly. If that's not turned on then it will use the signal from your cell towers to give u the general area.

 

[ncc1701p]

Sucks to be me.. I dont pay for SMS and I really never did. Ive been doing all my SMS via GV well since Ive had my GV years ago. Saves me $20/mo. I wish these apps could somehow read google voice's SMS then i'd install it. I did already lose my phone temporarily and it was in the most awesome of places. I locked it in a Server when I was changing out some memory. Wavesecure does seem pretty good. I sent an email to the devs but they really never responded on the "is SMS totally required for this to work". I did have a friend try it on his phone and it seems extremely good.