I understand that I am late to the party on this but I have finally got an iPhone, and I love it. A few years ago I gave up on notebook computers and moved back to a desktop because I missed having the performance and screen size that I could get from a desktop when compared to notebooks. I sold off my old notebook and moved to an iMac. The only downside is that I lost the advantage of portable computing. Now that I have an iPhone, I can do most things that I want to do on the go. I still enjoy having my “command centre” in my home office for when I need to get work done, so the melding of an iPhone into my tech life is very complimentary. I can take my iPhone out and check my email, news feeds, (poorly played) chess games, Twitter, Facebook, etc., on the go while still having a 20″ iMac on my desk at home. However, I am now lusting after the new 27″ quad-core iMac.

Time to get to the point. For the last few years I was used to having all my data stored on my computer that was safely looked away in my house at all times. This data never left my house and it was only vulnerable if someone broke into my house and physically stole my computer out of my house. I realize that this is still a risk but there is a better chance of me leaving my iPhone in a taxi, a restaurant, on public transit or some other place. Then what? First, I would hope that some kind soul would find it and generously get it back to me. I considered putting a “If lost…” sticker on my iPhone but that would diminish the sexiness of the iPhone. I finally came across this post on Lifehacker (one of my personal favourite blogs). You can read through the post but basically it suggests changing the lock screen wallpaper to your contact information. That way the iPhone can stay locked and if someone was going to be kind enough to return your iPhone they know how to contact you.

By now, I’m sure most of you are thinking that you can’t always rely on someone to return your iPhone. This is true. There are some great apps out there for the iPhone but there is no self-destruct app. However, there are some actions that you can take in order to secure your data. The first step would be to make sure that your iPhone requires a passcode in order to be unlocked. I have mine set to only activate after 5 minutes. This way I don’t have to constantly be entering a passcode into my phone if it locks while I’m using it. The other thing that I have done is I have turned on the “Erase Data” option. With this option enable all the data on the phone will be erased if the wrong passcode is attempted ten times in a row. At this point I am sure that whoever has found my iPhone has no intention of returning it but at least they can’t get to my data. You can see these settings in my iPhone screen shot below.

I am aware of the feature that Apple has through their mobile me service that will allow you to track your lost iPhone using the web and the iPhone’s gps. This requires a subscription to mobile me at a hundred dollars per year. Since I have no use for mobile me in general, this isn’t something that I am interested in.

I am sure that if one was determined enough they could plug the iPhone into a computer and get into the iPhone using various shady techiques. Someone could also break the window to my house and take everything I own, but I lock the doors and windows and hope nobody does such a thing. Based on that logic, I lock the door to my iPhone and rely a bit on the kindness of strangers to return my lost iPhone if I ever do lose it.

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About the author

Matt
I'm Matt and I share how to build an internet presence through internet business, social marketing, lifestyle design and productivity tools. While here, read about me to learn my story or find out how you can hire me.

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