When your phone carries your health information, credit cards, and private emails, not to mention all your social accounts and text conversations, losing it is...bad. As anyone who's ever left their phone in a cab knows, the apocalyptic feelings of panic are not pleasant.
Whether you've momentarily misplaced your phone at home or had it stolen while traveling, there are some easy steps you can take to mitigate the effects. These include precautionary actions you should take now, as well as things you should do before you actually invest in a new phone.
Losing your phone is never fun, but doing these 10 things will make it much less painful.
Before You Misplace Your Phone
Take some basic security precautions ahead of time. The easiest — and the best? Setting up a passcode. Go to your iPhone's Settings and click Touch ID & Passcode to set both up if you haven't already. Having both authentications enabled will secure your phone so that others can't unlock it. This is your best defense against a rando stealing it and making it their own.
Photo: Madeline Buxton.
The same goes for enabling Auto-Lock. Go to your Settings, press General, and scroll down to make sure Auto-Lock isn't set on "Never". This way, your phone will lock after a short period of time so that no one can access your information after you've unlocked it with a passcode or Touch ID.
Photo: Madeline Buxton.
If you do lose your phone, you still want to have access to all of your contacts, photos, and apps. Go to your iCloud account within your Settings and turn on iCloud Backup to have your account automatically back up data.
This way, you'll be able to sign into your iCloud account from another phone or desktop to download all of your information. (This is also incredibly useful when it's time to upgrade to a new handset.)
Photo: Madeline Buxton.
Write down your phone's serial number and store it in a secure place, whether that's your laptop or a notebook at home. Your serial number is useful if your phone crops up on Craigslist or eBay. You can find it by going to Settings, clicking General, and About.
For Android devices, your 15-character serial number is in the Status tab, which you can find by going to Settings and About Phone.
Photo: Madeline Buxton.
Within your iCloud Account (Settings, iCloud), you also have the option to turn on Find My iPhone. Doing so will let you track your iPhone wherever it is. You will also be able to erase the content on your phone remotely, lock your screen (if you don't have Auto-Lock enabled), and send a message to the phone that says, “This phone is lost. Please call ###-###-####."
On Android, you can go to Google Settings, click Security, and turn on Remotely Locate This Device and Allow Remote Lock and Erase. You can double-check that the feature is working correctly by looking at the location online.
Photo: Madeline Buxton.
When You've Misplaced Your Phone
If you own a Tile, a small Bluetooth tracker that you can connect to your phone, you can track your phone's location and call your phone by logging into your account on its website from another device.
Photo: App Store.
If you have Find My iPhone enabled, log into your iCloud account from a desktop computer or another device. On the main dashboard, tap Find My iPhone. You'll see the phone's GPS location and can track its location. Hopefully, your misplaced phone is just hiding at the bottom of your bag — but if you left it in a restaurant or a cab, this will let you know for sure.
For Android users, just go to the Android Device Manager online or use the app on a friend's phone.
Photo: Madeline Buxton.
You can use that same map to ping your iPhone, erase the material on it, or put your phone in Lost Mode(note: This will work for any Apple device, not just your iPhone). Along the map's upper toolbar, tap the arrow next to All Devices, select your iPhone, and choose Lost Mode from the three options.
Lost Mode will let you send a message to the phone and enter a phone number where anyone who has found it can reach you. Lost Mode also locks your phone and ensures that no one can use credit cards you have on file with Apple Pay. To disable Lost Mode, you'll just need to enter your passcode on the phone. (But if your phone is just somewhere nearby and you can't find it, you can try playing a sound instead to locate it, Marco Polo-style.)
All of these same features are available for Android users through your Google account on the Android Device Manager site.
Photo: Madeline Buxton.
To report your lost phone to law enforcement, have the serial number on hand. If you didn't write that number down beforehand, you can look it up in iTunes, if you've ever backed up to iTunes on your desktop. You can find the number by going to the Preferences tab in the toolbar and pressing devices.
Photo: iTunes.
If your phone really is gone for good and you need to buy a new one, call the credit card company that you used to buy the phone. If you have renter's insurance, you can also call the company that you bought that plan through. They may give you money toward investing in a new phone.
If you have mobile-protection insurance through your mobile carrier, that's even better, since it will cover a lost or stolen phone. That can cost as little as $11 per month.
You'll likely also want to erase the phone remotely (through Find My iPhone) to eliminate all the personal info you had on the phone. RIP.
Photo: App Store.
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