The time to set up phone tracking is now, while you still have the phone. Every option below depends on something being switched on beforehand, and none of it can be arranged after the phone is gone.
iPhone
Go to icloud.com/find from any browser, or use the Find My app on another Apple device, and sign in with the same account.
Four actions are available. Play Sound makes it chime even on silent, which solves the sofa cushion case. Lost Mode locks it, shows a message and a contact number on the screen, and suspends payment cards. Erase wipes it remotely. And the map shows its last known position.
Two features are worth enabling in advance under Settings, your name, Find My. Find My network lets your phone be located through other Apple devices nearby even when it has no signal of its own. Send Last Location transmits its position automatically when the battery is nearly flat, which is often the only fix you get from a phone that later dies.
Android
Go to google.com/android/find and sign in, or search “find my device” while signed into the same Google account.
The options mirror Apple’s: ring at full volume, secure the device with a message on screen, or erase it. Samsung owners have a parallel service at SmartThings Find, which occasionally locates a phone when Google’s cannot, so it is worth trying both.
Check in advance that Find My Device is switched on in Settings, and that location services are enabled. Both are on by default, but battery-saving apps and aggressive power settings sometimes disable them.
Do this before anything else
- Locate it from a browser, before the battery dies. Everything else is easier with a position.
- Ring it. Most lost phones are lost within thirty metres of the owner.
- Lock it with a message and an alternative contact number. An honest finder needs a way to reach you.
- Tell your network operator to bar the SIM if it is genuinely gone, which stops call charges and blocks SMS codes reaching a thief.
- Change the password on the account tied to the phone, from a different device.
Hold off on the remote wipe. Erasing usually removes the phone from your tracking account, which surrenders any chance of recovery. Wipe only once you have decided the phone is not coming back, or if it holds something that must not be exposed.
Never go and collect it yourself
The map shows an approximate position, often accurate only to a building or a street, and it can be several minutes out of date.
People have been seriously hurt confronting strangers over phones, and there have been cases of entirely innocent households visited because of an imprecise pin. Give the location to the police and let them handle it. A replacement handset is cheaper than the alternative.
The scam that follows a theft
Within days of reporting a phone lost, many people receive a message claiming their device has been found, with a link to sign in and view its location.
It is a fake sign-in page. A stolen phone is worth very little while it is still locked to your account, so thieves target the credentials that would unlock it. Enter them and the phone becomes resellable.
Apple and Google do not send such links. Check your device’s status by typing the address yourself, never by following a message.
Five minutes of preparation
- Confirm tracking is switched on, and test it by locating the phone once from a browser.
- Write down the IMEI, found by dialling
*#06#. Police and insurers ask for it and you cannot retrieve it later. - Set a real passcode, six digits or longer, not 0000 or a birthday.
- Check your backup is current, so a lost phone costs you a device rather than your photographs.
- Make sure a trusted person or a second device can reach your account, so you are not locked out by two-factor codes going to the missing phone.
That last point is the one that catches people hardest. If every recovery code goes to the phone you have just lost, you cannot sign in to look for it.
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