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Author Topic: My iPhone was snatched and stolen the other day Claude S. Ayakawa Film God Posts: 2738 From: Waipahu, Hawaii, USA Registered: Aug 2002 posted 11-01-2013 02:33 PM                        When I was using my iPhone the other day at a bus stop, a young man came up to me and snatched it right out of my hand and ran off with it. At my age, I was unable to run after him to get my phone back and this disturbed me very much. Many people at the bus stop had witnessed the incident and a woman was kind enough to contact TMobile for me so I could put a hold on my phone. I was going to call the police but the TMobile rep told me a police report was not necessary when filing a insurance claim to replace the phone. In the old days, it would have been a pain to reload all my telephone numbers, music and other things I had stored on the phone but I have iCloud and was told it would be a breeze to restore almost everything I had on the phone that was stolen by a simple procedure. The TMobile rep also told me the phone that was taken from me would be worthless and unusable after I had reported it was stolen. The phone I lost was a black iPhone 5 that I got as soon as TMobile started to sell the Apple product -Claude  |  IP: Logged Ken Lackner Phenomenal Film Handler Posts: 1907 From: Atlanta, GA, USA Registered: Sep 2001 posted 11-01-2013 02:40 PM                     Snatched right out of your hand!? Wow. That kid had balls. What the crap is wrong with people? I'm glad you were able to resolve things quickly and easily with your provider. Although replacing the device and restoring your data seems like it is going to be relatively simple, I would be concerned about theft of sensitive data. Hopefully you don't have any data stored on the device that could pose a security risk to you if stolen, or if you do, the data is protected. Sorry to hear this happened to you. Hopefully you get it replaced as quickly and easily as it sounds like you will.  |  IP: Logged Claude S. Ayakawa Film God Posts: 2738 From: Waipahu, Hawaii, USA Registered: Aug 2002 posted 11-01-2013 03:18 PM                        Except for a lot of telephone numbers and a few client's portrait appointments I had listed on the phone's note page, there were no sensitive data on the phone that was stolen, Ken. All of these datas was not lost because I have them all backed up elsewhere including iCloud. If the thief enjoys classical music which I doubt, he would be in luck because there were about fifty albums I had downloaded on to the phone. I also had a collection of my professional photography images on the device plus a few stuff I had bookmarked off the internet. -Claude  |  IP: Logged Leo Enticknap Film God Posts: 7474 From: Loma Linda, CA Registered: Jul 2000 posted 11-01-2013 04:04 PM                        quote: Claude S. Ayakawa If the thief enjoys classical music which I doubt... Well if you read a report in the local paper of the police raiding a meth lab with Brahms's second piano concerto playing in the background (sounds like a scene from a David Lynch movie, doesn't it!), you'll know that they got the guy. Reminds me of a few years ago, when a relative's house was burgled. The one item found to be missing from the garage was a former vodka bottle (which still had the vodka label on it), the original contents of which had long been finished and which, when it was nicked, contained power steering liquid. The police caught the culprit after he was admitted to a nearby casualty department with acute poisoning. Sorry to hear about your experience, and hope the phone has been replaced and reloaded by now.  |  IP: Logged Claude S. Ayakawa Film God Posts: 2738 From: Waipahu, Hawaii, USA Registered: Aug 2002 posted 11-01-2013 04:26 PM                        That is a good story, Leo. Apple has a app for iPhones that makes it possible to trace a lost or stolen phone but unfortunately I did not download it on to the phone that was stolen. I have learned my lesson and will do it on my new replacement phone when I have a Apple rep help me restore as much of by data with iCloud. I see you are now residing in the United States, Leo. Did you get married already? -Claude  |  IP: Logged Bobby Henderson "Ask me about Trajan." Posts: 10973 From: Lawton, OK, USA Registered: Apr 2001 posted 11-01-2013 04:31 PM                     This type of crime is quite common, especially in large cities like New York City. Thieves specifically tend to target people using an Apple iPhone. The crime has been dubbed "apple picking." A person making a call in a busy setting, like on a city street near a bus stop, isn't going to be paying quite so much attention to his surroundings. Same thing goes if the phone user is tapping away on some app or sending text messages. A thief may calmly walk up, snatch the phone right out of the caller's hands and take off running. Sounds like a good way for a klepto to catch a few bullets in his back here in Oklahoma, but I digress. The most scary thing about apple picking is identity theft tends to be one of the motives. If you're on your phone when a thief steals it right out of your hands he won't have to get around a lock screen to get at any data on the phone or any "cloud" data accessible by the phone. One must be careful about what kind of data is put into iCloud, Dropbox, etc. A thief can go on a buying spree if he grabs an Android phone with credit cards keyed into Google Wallet. Most victims have only one option: calling their mobile phone carrier ASAP and having them turn off the phone ASAP. With as much customer tracking that already goes on with mobile phones I think the phone carriers and police could do a lot more to bust criminals who steal phones. End user level security software, such as Lookout Mobile for Android phones, can only do so much. A thief can do a factory reset on the phone without fully booting it and anything the security software could do would be circumvented. OTOH, the phone hardware from what I understand is pretty unique. It shouldn't be hard for a phone carrier to tag a specific phone as being stolen and turn it into a digital hot potato shouting "I wanna go to jail" for whoever is holding it.  |  IP: Logged Brad Miller Administrator Posts: 17775 From: Plano, TX (36.2 miles NW of Rockwall) Registered: May 99 posted 11-01-2013 05:51 PM                     quote: Leo Enticknap Reminds me of a few years ago, when a relative's house was burgled. The one item found to be missing from the garage was a former vodka bottle (which still had the vodka label on it), the original contents of which had long been finished and which, when it was nicked, contained power steering liquid. The police caught the culprit after he was admitted to a nearby casualty department with acute poisoning. Oh man that's awesome. Claude needs to start walking around with liquor bottles.  |  IP: Logged

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