Lost your Smartphone? You’re not alone; in fact 3.1 million Americans lost their Smartphone in 2013 alone, making it one of the items which one is highly likely to lose in a lifetime. The issue is not that you lost your Smartphone, but the problem lies with the data and information getting into wrong hands. Smartphone today houses same computing power as a laptop; it holds your credit card information, photos, notes, contacts, social network, emails and host of other important information which you don’t want to lose. Smartphone today carries more information than your traditional laptops or desktops, with the cloud storage on the go offering the possibilities has only increased. Now you get it what is at stake when your phone is lost. Your Smartphone doubles up as a wallet as well; the usage of Smartphone to settle your bills will only increase in coming years, with Apple Pay and Google Wallet you get to pay your bills with a simple wave.
Smartphone industry off late (starting 2014) has come together to deal with the Smartphone getting lost or stolen problem, Smartphone equipped with GPS and data connectivity offers smart options to deal with this “getting lose” problem. Google has equipped all android phones running Android version 2.2 and above with app called “Android Device Manager” which can save your information and also reveal your lost phone’s current location.
Before you start reaping in the benefits you need to
- Install Android Device Manger on your Android Smartphone, if not already installed (https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.google.android.apps.adm&hl=en)
- Go to settings on your device and touch “Security”
- Under “Android Device Manager, toggle (on) switch to “Allow remote lock and factory reset” and “Remotely locate this device”.
- Make sure you use a frequently used Google Account
- Open setting menu
- Under “Personal” menu touch “Location”, toggle the switch to “On”
- Just to be sure, login into web using the same Google account, check if you’re able to view your device’s location (https://www.google.com/android/devicemanager )
How to lock android phone remotely?
- With the above steps now you have a working Android Device Manager
- Go to web interface https://www.google.com/android/devicemanager
- After successful Google Account login, you’ll see your phone’s current location in the map and three options namely “Ring”, “Lock” and “Erase”.
- Clicking on “Lock”, it will bring a dialog box that will ask you to enter a new password/PIN, it doesn’t matters if you don’t have the password/PIN security enabled on your Android Smartphone
- Choose a lengthy and strong password, Google recommends not use the same Google Account password which you used while login into Android Device Manager
- Click “Lock” on the dialogue box
- Within seconds you’ll notice screen on your selected phone will turn off and when turning it on the device will ask for the password/PIN.
If you strongly suspect that your phone was stolen then consider “Erase”, this option will remotely wipe your device including any SD card, it will also shoot you an email where and when the device was wiped.
Google recently starting April 2015 has included your phone’s location as a search output when you Google “Find my phone”, you should be logged in using the same Google account which was used to setup Android device manager on your android phone. Good luck!
