How to contact owner of lost+found iPhone with Activation Lock?

I picked up an iPhone 11 in the park and the iPhone is lost. How can I contact the owner of the picked up iPhone?

The owner of a lost phone has an option to display a message on the screen with instructions on how to return the phone, but if the owner doesn’t use this feature there is no way to contact them.

Your idea is well thought through. It’s honestly complete nonsense that they don’t have some type of solution like this. In the VERY LEAST a finder should be able to mark the phone as found and Apple ping the owner and encourage them to mark it as lost if they want it back.

bdowdy wrote:

Your idea is well thought through. It’s honestly complete nonsense that they don’t have some type of solution like this. In the VERY LEAST a finder should be able to mark the phone as found and Apple ping the owner and encourage them to mark it as lost if they want it back.

Anyone that has lost a device can set a message in the display, as has been mentioned. See the highlighted text below.

There are cases where that message won’t be set, whether because the mechanism wasn’t recognized as being available, or because the loss involves stolen devices from people or organizations that might not have been identified as being stolen yet or might not care it was stolen, and cases where the device was stolen by an abusive ex and the partner does not want to re-establish contact with someone harassing them, or is hateful or criminally-inclined, or physically abusive, or worse.

And for all anybody here knows, some of y’all posting in this thread are looking to contact, harass, or rip off, or assault, or worse, the owner of the device that y’all yourselves stole, too.

We just don’t know the situation.

And if y’all think even a simple “ping” wouldn’t be misused for at least harassment, well, welcome to the sordid side of humanity.

Got a found device, turn it into lost-and-found, or local police. Or recycle it.

Well, the problem is that a lost phone has no way of sending anything; it has no cellular or Wi-Fi connection, and, as it is locked, there is no way to establish a cellular or Wi-Fi connection. It’s an interesting idea, but the implementation is close to impossible.

In this particular case the phone has been erased, which is why it is showing that it is activation locked, and it has probably also been blacklisted, so no carrier will allow it on the carrier’s network.

Fredz_bais15 wrote:

I picked up an iPhone 11 in the park and the iPhone is lost. How can I contact the owner of the picked up iPhone?

As was correctly mentioned by Lawrence Finch above “The owner of a lost phone has an option to display a message on the screen with instructions on how to return the phone, but if the owner doesn’t use this feature there is no way to contact them.”

Apple will not identify the owner. Too much risk of fraud, theft, scams, assaults, or worse.

Turn the device into local police if that’s an option, or to whoever manages lost and found for the park.

Tuffy Nicolas wrote:

Yeah, I guess there's no way to send a message. But...don't some phones have an "Emergency/SOS call" option that's even accessible on the startup screen, before any passcode has been entered? I think I've seen that before. If so, how are those emergency/SOS calls made, if the caller is some random person who similarly has no access to fully using the phone itself? The phone making the SOS call must have some way of making an outgoing connection.

Emergency/SOS calls. are what, in the U.S., would be called 911 calls – to the police, to the Fire Department, or to the hospital (because, e.g., someone is suffering a heart attack). They are for calls involving true emergencies.

The discovery of a lost or stolen phone is not an emergency. It is not equivalent to a house catching fire – which might result in killing those inside, and burning down the whole neighborhood if the fire is not contained. Nor is it equivalent to someone calling because a criminal is trying to break into their house in the middle of the night.

Could that same communication method be used to send my proposed "I found your phone" notification?

No, because it would be seen as a misuse of that high-priority communications channel.

Tuffy Nicolas wrote:

I think the real problem with my proposal is that nefarious people could use it to demand "ransom" money for the return of a lost (or stolen) phone, e.g. "I found your phone. Do you want me to send it back to you?" "Yes!" "OK, I'll sent it back -- but only if you first give me $100!" Then the naive owner Venmos $100 to the guy, who just laughs and keeps the phone anyway.

Bad people are why we can't have nice things (like a phone lost+found system).

Indeed.

There is a common phishing scam: The owner gets a text or email from “Apple” or “Apple Security” (or sometimes “Police”) saying your phone has been found and to click on a link to see its location. This is NEVER from Apple or from law enforcement; it is from the thief or fence to steal your Apple ID and identity. Delete any such message without responding to it. Apple never gets involved in lost or stolen devices→Avoid phishing emails, fake ‘virus‘ alerts, phony support calls, and other scams

Hello ~ You can always turn it in to law enforcement near where you found it.

~Katana-San~

iPhone does not store contact info in the SIM. Carrier info only.

That’s assuming the SIM is associated with an active plan, too.

Tuffy Nicolas wrote:

Found an iPhone 13 on the beach (in a foreign country while on vacation).

…

Any solution to this dilemma?

You could always mail the phone to the police department or the hotel lost & found department in the town where you were vacationing, with a letter explaining how and where you found this phone there while on vacation.

If the owner of the phone is local to that area, and keeps checking lost & found departments, they might get their phone back that way.

Otherwise, recycle it responsibly.

Hello ~ You are also responding to someone who started this thread back in October of last year. Please read *MrHoffman’s* post for some details that may explain well.

~Katana-San~