iPhone 5 missing / stolen ?

[Ripon83]

So my wife reaches out and says my phone's gone and I think a tweeker might of snagged it off her desk. We log into to find my phone and its turned off. Thus no location.

So we engage the "lost mode" and now what - just wait? Does someone have to turn it on or can they just eliminate the sim and sell it too someone willing to buy a stolen phone? I take it when they register with a new phone service our serial number reported as stolen won't matter?

[Steve G]

Stolen Iphone is pretty much useless to a thief when icloud locked.

[m850168]

Disclaimer - I'm no expert, this is just my understanding, please take with a grain of salt. Or several.

Because it's off, lost mode will not take effect until its powered on and goes online. Thus, if it is powered on somewhere without a cell signal or wifi, it's possible airplane mode could be engaged. If it had a passcode that would still be in place. Also, it might be possible to boot it into some other mode (restore mode, I think) where it could then be set up as a new phone.

If it does connect to the internet, it will go into Lost Mode and you should be able to track it. I assume you would get some kind of notification if that happens, but I'm guessing. I believe part of lost mode is an activation lock, which prevents the device from being activated as long as it's still attached to your apple account (meaning there's little actual resale value, but if the phone was stolen the thief is probably going to sell it to an unsuspecting buyer and be gone when they discover activation is impossible).

As for what you do, I would make sure any message that's going to appear on the phone indicates your current contact info, and that you're willing to offer a reward - if the thief sees that it's in lost mode and a hassle to resell, they may return it for a reward instead. Unless you get some kind of confirmation the phone is actually in lost mode (not just that the request was sent and it will go into lost mode next time it is online) you should also assume the phone has been compromised and change your email passwords, apple id passwords, etc. and scour those accounts for any sign of intrusion.

[Ripon83]

It is set to notify us when it comes on, its set to lock when someone connects to the Internet either via phone service or wifi and its only been a few hours - and nothing. There is a possibility its a disgruntled co worker that my wife has tried to get fired for being a lame ***** in which case that person will probably drop it in a river just to hose my wife over.

[Ripon83]

PS I changed the OS language to Russian....hope they have fun with that.