Giving a smartphone to the website is not always pleasant

The Verge tells the story of Jane McGonigal - an American author and game designer who sent a Google Pixel 5a phone back to an authorized repair shop in October. As it turned out later, the device fell into the hands of a not very honest person. This one was to take over the entire content of the phone, including private photos of the woman. He changed some passwords and set filters in Gmail in such a way that all security alerts would be marked as spam. They were never going to McGonigal. Alternative e-mail addresses were also to be changed, preventing her from regaining access to accounts and receiving notifications about further changes.

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But back to the beginning. The phone was supposed to reach a Google service center in Texas, which is confirmed by the courier tracking at Fedex. However, the website says that it never received it. McGonigal paid for a replacement phone and fought the Google Customer Center for a refund for the next several weeks. She also demanded an explanation of the situation. Meanwhile, she started trying to remotely lock the device and erase data from it - to no avail. The phone was not turned on. It also could not be turned on before being sent to the site.

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Hours after Google finally honored her requests and refunded the charges, McGonigal, she says, realized that someone had hijacked access to her lost phone. It was noticed by, among others in Dropbox activity logs, where she stored some of her photos. She noticed similar, suspicious behavior on Google Drive and Google Photos. And although McGonigal cannot fully explain what happened to the phone, he has a lot of regret to Google that for several weeks no one on the other side came up with the idea of ​​trying to prevent possible attempts to get to the phone immediately after turning it on and did not say what way can protect yourself with a lost smartphone.

It is not known who is behind it: an employee of an authorized Google service or a courier who somehow managed to turn on the device and get to its contents. It is also puzzling how it was possible to defeat the phone's security, including the code / pattern to unlock the screen. McGonigal does not mention what forms of blockage she used.

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To some extent, this will reduce the likelihood of additional problems. If the smartphone falls into the wrong hands, this person will have limited access to data important for our privacy. Although we will not block access to the files stored on it, we will effectively hinder access to the mailbox, messengers or cloud services. Provided that companies and the services they offer have the option of removing the device associated with them. In an emergency, it is also worth using the option of remote smartphone lock.

Factory settings? It's not always possible to reset the phone

The case is complicated and you never really know where our devices end up. It is not known what happens to the repaired equipment or who has access to it. We are left with faith in the honesty of the person who will take care of him. If your smartphone and other devices are covered by the manufacturer's warranty, the authorized service is the first place where we look for help. And it should be a guarantee that nothing bad will happen. History shows, however, that we do not always come across an honest employee. The case of Apple, which had to pay multi-million dollar compensation, proves this perfectly. The nude photos of the client were shared on the network by a service technician who was supposed to repair the damaged iPhone. Instead of focusing on his work, he came up with the idea that he would review the content of the device and upload the naked photos of the owner to Facebook. And that's a way that suggested the victim herself did it.

Unfortunately, there is no 100% protection against this type of event. Fortunately, these happen sporadically. Or at least they are occasionally spoken of. However, it is worth remembering that before returning the equipment for repair, make sure that it has been restored to the factory settings. As long as it is of course possible. This will allow you to delete all data stored in it and minimize unexpected troubles.

Featured Image: Kilian Seiler on Unsplash