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Can a thief get into my phone

I had my phone stolen over two years ago. I was in the underground so not online. I immediately knew it had been stolen and got my partner to activate the 'ERASE' through the 'find my phone'. I reported it to the police and also to apple who assured me that as soon as the phone tried to connect to the internet, the ERASE would take place so everything was safe and that basically, whatever poor soul got sold my phone by the thief, would be receiving a 'useless brick'. BUT for two years I can see my phone still in my 'find my phone' as 'erase pending'. The police informed me that apple can not guarantee that my phone will be erased and shouldn't have told me so. So for two years I've been worried that someone would be able to access all the information on my phone. Today I receive the automatically generated email from Apple (and yes it is genuine), saying that 'Activation Lock is requesting your password'. Now I realise that without my Apple ID and password, no one can get into that phone, but am I really that safe? If someone can manage to bypass this step, there is loads of info on that phone!! As the police said, apple cant guarantee that the phone will be erased, so how safe am I? Is there anything I should be doing to safeguard myself further??

iPhone 7 Plus

Posted on Jun 28, 2021 5:57 AM

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Posted on Jun 28, 2021 6:59 AM

To supplement Chattanoogan’s excellent advice, here is how to change your Apple ID password→Change your Apple ID password - Apple Support.

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5 replies

Jun 28, 2021 6:06 AM in response to caricross

your safe if you don't jailbreak your phone, but not sure why you would still seeing an erase status 2 years ago, it's possible the phone never got turned on long enough. as far as getting hacked it really hard outside of a government pulling data from a cellular provider which doesn't even need your phone. as far as your data goes unless you had no passcode, or they guessed it there's not a reason Apple would have given them assistance to get in.

Jun 28, 2021 6:16 AM in response to JimmyCMPIT

Thanks for that - not too technical myself....can the thief 'jailbreak' my old phone? I'm still seeing it under 'my devices' on find my phone as I never actually removed the device. I was told to keep it there so that I could see the status of it...obviously hoping that I would eventually see it as 'erased' rather than erase pending. I've just assumed that the thief never managed to activate it at all seeing as the status of the phone hasn't changed in just over two years. This is why I was a little worried today, when out of the blue I get this email saying someone is trying to get into the phone


Jun 28, 2021 6:29 AM in response to caricross

If you had a passcode on your phone your data is safe. I doubt that you got an email from Apple, however, because 2FA never uses email for authentication. And spoofing Apple notifications is the primary way that criminals trick people into disabling activation lock.


And you can’t jailbreak a phone without unlocking it. And jailbreaking does not defeat Activation Lock.

Jun 28, 2021 6:38 AM in response to caricross

The thought of one’s device “out there in the wild ” is always unsettling.


However, phone sounds as secure as you could have possibly made it, and it also sounds like you’ve done eveything right.


Going forward, I’d only suggest the following (which you might have done already):


1) DON’T remove the device from your AppleID account. (as doing so would release the activation lock)


2) DO review all details in your AppleID account; paying particular attention to your devices and recovery phone numbers.


3) DO change your AppleID password. (this will likely necessitate a round of “new sign-in required” on your current devices)


4) DO Activate 2-Factor Authentication.




Can a thief get into my phone

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