How To Track My Stolen Windows Phone
If you lot have lost your Windows Telephone (whether that'due south a Microsoft Lumia, HTC, Nokia, or a Samsung device), or maybe someone stole it, you should non panic straightaway. Instead, your best bet is to locate it using Microsoft's Detect My Phone service.
Microsoft provides modern Windows Phones (2014 or subsequently) with this service (which technically is a phone tracking app). In most cases information technology has been automatically installed when you lot first ran your phone (more than on that later) i.east. prior to y'all losing it. In that way you tin can locate your phone remotely via your computer AFTER it may have been gone missing.
Here's how.
Find the pin-betoken location of your phone on a map!
- Visit account.microsoft.com/devices on your calculator and log in with your Microsoft account credentials.
- If you think your phone has moved, hit Refresh to call up its latest location.
- You should be able to run across your telephone on the map.
Don't come across your phone on the map? Aught happens when y'all refresh? Bound down to our department "You lot have lost your phone and cannot locate it on the map. What now?"
Later checking your phone'southward location on the map, you will take several options depending on where it is:
Ring your phone via your calculator
If your phone is at home, or at work, or any other identify with people you can trust, then you tin can only endeavour ringing it via Detect my Phone service so that someone volition exist able to find it.
Fifty-fifty if the book is turned off or your Windows Phone is set to vibrate mode, yous volition still be able to make information technology ring loudly. To practice that, you should:
- Open a browser in your reckoner or your telephone and immediately go to https://business relationship.microsoft.com/devices.
- Select your Windows Phone from the list and open the Find My Phone service.
- Click on the Ring push and attempt to run across if you tin can hear your phone.
Lock your telephone
In case your phone is lost in an unknown location, your next form of activeness should exist locking it. That way, simply you lot will exist able to access it.
You lot can lock your phone and display a message of your selection in the lock screen (see some of our template examples below). The good news is that you can do this even if you do not have a password lock already.
Perhaps you lot might too think about including a phone number in the bulletin so that if a Good Samaritan finds the phone, they can call you lot and give it dorsum to yous.
- Like before, open up a browser and go to https://account.microsoft.com/devices.
- Open the Detect My Telephone service.
- Click on the Lock button and follow the instructions on the screen.
Erase the data on the phone
As a last resort, you will have the option of erasing everything on the phone. This will preclude thieves from having access to your personal things, such as your photos, videos, and fifty-fifty your credit carte information.
Be Aware: One time y'all do this, there is no turning dorsum. This will besides erase your Microsoft business relationship from the phone, then you will no longer be able to rails it.
Even afterward you erase data from your telephone, you volition still take access to anything you have backed upward on OneDrive as explained farther downwards.
- Go to https://account.microsoft.com/devices in your browser.
- Open up Discover My Phone.
- Click on Erase and confirm that you wish to proceed.
Bank check out the video from Windowscentral that explains how it works:
Detect My Telephone app may non e'er work!
While the Find My Phone service has received decent feedback from users, some report that information technology does not work as consistently equally they would like. For example, it might not update the phone'south location for hours on stop.
The service besides does non save its concluding location if a user turns it off manually. So if a thief is quick and immediately turns the phone off, you lot volition not exist able to locate it.
Yous have lost your phone and cannot locate it on the map. What at present?
If you cannot observe your phone on the map using the Find my Phone service, it might exist due to either that:
- Your Windows Telephone is besides sometime (pre-2014) then the Find My Phone service is not available to you.
- If your telephone is actually new, and then you might take non selected the recommended settings when kickoff setting up your phone (come across beneath). It's these recommended settings that enable the Find my Phone service. If you customized them and left out Find my Phone service that's really bad luck.
Reasons why no telephone could have been located
Nevertheless tin can't locate it even though you are certain you had the service working?
You should be informed that if your phone cannot transmit a indicate (whether cellular or GPS), at that place is simply no way to locate it, no affair what kind of phone you accept or what service or tracking app you are using.
The nearly common reasons why a phone cannot transmit a signal are:
- If the SIM card is removed, there is no data connection.
- A thief but turned the phone off, or the battery died.
- Mobile information is turned off i.e. no bespeak will be transmitted, even with GPS on.
- Last known location was not saved before the telephone was turned off.
Discover my Phone by Microsoft is the only app you could have used to find your Windows Phone after you have already lost information technology (without having installed some other one before y'all lost it). Simply earlier nosotros give upward completely lets review some of the old-schoolhouse means to retrieving and protecting, in fact, any phone, not but the Windows Phone.
When apps fail to assist: alternative ways to observe your phone & protect your data
I accept to be honest with y'all, from here on out it will be much more difficult to find a lost or stolen telephone. Even so, with the advice below, you will increment your chances of finding your phone and protect your data.
Please notation: the more time passes, your chances of retrieving the phone worsen.
The thief might remove the SIM and sell it or your battery might drain and then y'all want to human action apace earlier that happens. In such cases, no point volition be transmitted from your phone. In other words, you lot will non exist able to rail it remotely or even call it anymore.
Lost telephone? Retrace your steps and look for the telephone
The concept of retracing your steps to detect something lost is well-established and information technology tin definitely work for your phone too. Relax. Take a few deep breaths of air. History repeats itself. If you've lost information technology earlier, remind yourself where it was and bank check those places first (look in the obvious places; it might just be at that place, in your jacket pocket).
If y'all believe that your phone is simply lost and non stolen, then you should try and going back to every identify y'all accept recently visited. Ask effectually and someone might have really seen the telephone.
For example, if yous lost it in a cinema, someone might have handed it over to the reception. Asking people in such cases never hurts as y'all might get your phone back without hassle.
Alter all your passwords and so that thieves cannot access your accounts
This is the first thing you lot should do if you doubtable you lot misplaced it exterior the home. Even if your phone is locked, thieves who are technologically inclined may be able to hack it and get information on you. As such, you should seriously consider hanging all of your passwords.
This is peculiarly important if yous have stored credit card information in in that location. In fact, if that is the case, y'all should too contact your depository financial institution and written report the incident and then that they tin can go along a lookout for suspicious activities.
Send a bulletin and offer a reward
Before you do anything else, transport a message to your phone (from a friend or relative'due south phone) and say that whoever finds it and returns it to X address volition receive a advantage. Alternatively, include a number in the message so that anyone who finds it tin call it.
Of course, this will not piece of work if your phone is actually stolen. All the same, thieves might think that you are not actually tracking your phone so you may even salve yourself some time.
Here are some example templates that you can modify to your liking. Make certain to include a number where anyone who finds the phone tin can attain you.
If you suspect that it'southward STOLEN, try something like this:
Appeal to the thief'due south sentimental side:
$100 will go to whoever returns this phone as information technology includes photos of my family which are precious to me. Please write/telephone call X.
Offer a reward with no questions asked:
$100 reward for returning this telephone, no questions asked! Delight write/telephone call X.
Try not to threaten them equally they might throw the phone away if scared:
Please return this phone to this address, I will not inquire whatever questions or involve the police in any way!
Or, if you think that the phone is LOST, try something like this:
Enter a friend'due south number and enquire whoever finds the telephone to phone call you:
Whoever returns this phone volition have my eternal gratitude. Please call/write X!
Include an address (BUT non your home or piece of work!)
Please render this phone at X java shop. No questions asked!
Last resort? Accomplish out to your carrier and ask for help
In some cases, your carrier might agree to use cell phone triangulation to locate your phone. Basically, carriers can use cell towers to endeavor and pinpoint where the phone is by measuring the altitude from the tower.
That way, they can receive the location of your phone on a map, simply like you would accept if y'all had been using Find My Phone. Withal, it will non be every bit accurate every bit the technology involved is inferior to GPS.
With all that said, it is indeed very unlikely that carriers will agree to rails your telephone as such processes are reserved for more serious matters where the police is also involved, such as a kidnapping or other serious crime.
Still, there is nothing wrong with asking anyway as they might be able to actually retrieve your phone'due south location.
If too much time has passed, yous should take the fact that your phone is gone. What should you lot practise now?
Unfortunately, in some cases, y'all will need to accept the fact the phone is lost and in that location is nothing yous tin do about retrieving it anymore.
In fact, if you practise not find your telephone earlier the bombardment runs out, and so you probably won't go it back.
Here is what to do later accepting that the phone is gone.
Contact your carrier, y'all might even be able to get another phone
If you have insurance on your phone, your carrier might exist able to replace it. Otherwise, they will be able to turn off all services including texts, messages, and data and so that thieves will non exist able to utilise services you are paying for.
Study your stolen phone to the constabulary
It may as well exist a good idea to visit your local police section and study that your phone has been stolen. It is highly unlikely that they volition exist able to exercise annihilation about it only they might ask for the serial number just in instance.
Since you lot do not accept physical access to your phone, you volition need to notice the original receipt to locate the series number. If you bought your phone online, y'all may also be able to contact the identify you bought information technology from and show them the order so that they can retrieve the serial number.
And finally, grab anything you take uploaded to OneDrive and change your password
As you may or may not know, a lot of the files in your telephone are automatically uploaded to OneDrive. Your photos, for case, may reside there.
To check, go to the OneDrive, log in with your Microsoft business relationship, and encounter if in that location is anything in there. If there is, grab everything in there, and change your countersign.
The good news? Even if you choose to erase your data with Find My Telephone, it volition still be bachelor in OneDrive and so you volition exist able to access it even though the thieves will non!
What you should practice to protect your Windows Phone Earlier y'all lose it or go it stolen
You may have recently lost your Windows Phone (and got a new one) or heard that something similar happened to a friend. And at present y'all are wondering how to protect it.
Towards that end, you should :
1. Make sure that Find My Phone is Enabled AND working correctly
To bank check whether all the Notice My Telephone settings are enabled, head over to Settings > Updates & Security > Observe My Phone.
There, you should be able to run into a setting that reads:
Save my device's location periodically so it's
easier to find, even if the location is off.
Check it! That is the only option you will see if the feature is not enabled. Equally such, you should immediately bank check that box to plough the service on.
Depending on your device, you will and so run into other options such as:
Relieve my phone's location periodically and
before the bombardment runs out to make information technology easier to find.
Bank check information technology! This pick could not exist more than descriptive even if information technology tried to.
Another thing y'all might see is:
Save my device's location more frequently.
Check information technology! This is basically the same thing as above, just worded differently.
All the settings have now been taken intendance of. Head over to http://business relationship.microsoft.com/devices
and follow the steps above to bank check if everything is working correctly.
ii. Apply the FREE "FollowMee" app to runway your phone
Our rating:
FollowMee is the all-time app to locate your lost Windows Phone exterior of Microsoft'due south own Discover My Phone. It uses GPS, Wi-Fi, and cellular triangulation to locate your telephone and record its location.
After yous install and run the app, it will transmit your phone's location in a secure map which you tin access via the FollowMee website.
The app has a premium version besides with additional features merely yous do not demand them. The free version allows y'all to runway your phone's location on a existent-time map, which is all you lot really demand to find your phone.
iii. If FollowMee does not work, attempt "Phone Tracker" (Gratis)
Our rating:
For some people, FollowMee might not work or might not be available. For instance, it might non exist bachelor in certain countries due to licensing restrictions.
In such cases, Phone Tracker app for Windows can prove to be a viable alternative. The interface of the app is somewhat outdated just it is more than powerful than it looks.
Telephone Tracker logs the phone's position every half an hour and if the signal is good, it tin can fifty-fifty track its movement across a map. The good news is that it tin can also brandish logs from days, weeks, or fifty-fifty months past.
Unfortunately, some users accept reported that information technology is not always accurate so you should test it as soon as you install it.
Have y'all lost your Windows Phone recently? Did yous become it back in the end? Permit usa know in the comments!
Source: https://cellphonetracker.net/find-my-windows-phone/
Posted by: szabonece2002.blogspot.com
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