Lost Mobile Recovery

Recover your Lost / Stolen mobile

... continued from the previous post Prevent Mobile Loss.

I would not have written the previous blog until I recovered the phone. As I was not sure if they really help? Now I am sure that they do help. So continuing with the story of what I did after I lost my mobile to the point where I found it.

SIM Blocking: First thing you have to do is to get your SIM blocked. Although I did not do it right away I was trying to get hold of the rickshaw driver and wanted him to pick it up and then ask him to return it. But sometime later the mobile was switched off and the SIM was thrown for obvious reasons. Blocking of SIM can help you by stopping the unlawful usage of your SIM money.

Duplicate SIM: Secondly you should go to the subscriber and get a duplicate SIM issued so that you don't miss any phone call (some big business opportunity) and save the trouble of distributing your new number to everyone.

In some cases you will require a police FIR to get your SIM blocked. But in my case my subscriber blocked it on just a phone call and I could get the duplicate SIM with the same number without even going to police station.

FIR at Police Station for mobile loss: Now go to the police station. ( Don't hear if your relatives and friends say "a lost mobile is forever gone", "if you have followed the above two steps already no use going to Police" etc) Even if you hear police is useless they don't do a thing and will make you run all around and discourage you, you have to go to them because they might be your last or may be only hope. Also it might save you from trouble if your phone was used in some unlawful activity. You have the proof that you have reported it.

So which police station to go. yes Which? Because if you go to a wrong police station they will give you jurisdiction crap. You have come to wrong police station go to some other station. Specially in cases where you have lost mobile while commuting lot of jurisdiction crap falls on you. Make sure where you saw your mobile last and goto a police station in that area.

You are at a police station and you say your mobile is stolen. First thing they will ask your identity (I took photocopy of documents along with me) and that you have the bills with you. So now I was sent to the inspector inside. Hmmm now be ready to hear all crap and a proof that it was all because of you and your negligence that you lost the mobile. Mind it lost not stolen. Be calm, clear and explain if you think otherwise or else accept it that you have lost it.

Its time to ask them courteously to lodge a complaint for it. If possible be ready with a application. I wasn't, so wrote it there. Now, What to write in the application? The application should clearly explain all the details about your equipment especially IMEI number and including Serial Number, manufacturer, model and cost. Following this write a detailed account about the steps leading to the loss of mobile. Try to be specific and provide details wherever possible. Also obviously provide your details and phone number. Submit and keep a photocopy of the complaint signed and stamped by inspector.

Make sure to look into your bill (post paid connection bill with detailed call log) for any phone calls made by your mobile on the day it lost and before you blocked it. Also provide this details to police when you find any.

The WAIT: The only thing you do now is wait. Wait, hope and pray :). Even if you go to police again you will be told that once we find it we will call you. The problem here is that even if you gave the IMEI number your mobile can not be found if a SIM is not inserted in it for e.g., in cases of a PDA which has many functions other than calling. Also the police most probably sets alert in that state only. Meaning if your mobile is sold or used outside it might not be found (not sure about this fact although.) It actually depends on the law of the country. Some countries even maintain shared databases of theft reported mobiles so that the mobile could be found even outside the country. But that's not the case in India I guess.

The Surprise Call: One day after so many days of waiting( Lost : 24 Nov 08, Two days before the heinous Mumbai attacks and after 1 year 7 days of buying it. Found : 8 Jan 09, 45 days after losing it) I got a call from the police station saying that they have found my mobile and I need to come to the police station. At police station they told me that they have located it and will have to go and recover it. The place is about 40KMs away and I would have to go along with them, or they can bring it. I said I would come along.

Well they weren't expecting this answer. They said I would have to go to office etc, so they said its Okay they can bring it for me. Then the explanation came to how difficult it is to recover it, they have to go in night and wait for the guy. And they would need to go by taxi and will have to eat. Also how high on crime that area is and hence recovery is difficult. Hearing their woeful PLIGHT I had to offer them help and shed some GANDHI BAPUs. I offered them 400 Bucks. They asked me how much it is and then these guys got angry. Tells me to go home and take the money with me. They will call the person and ask him to return the phone at my home address and There is no need to worry. Well it seemed just like in movies but truth is TRUTH. Obviously it was a scare but I had no choice or that was how it looked to me. I Shed a few more GANDHI BAPUs. They accepted it GLADLY. And told me to go home and wait for their call the next day or just come in the evening, they MIGHT be able to recover it.

Even after all that I had no surety of getting the mobile back. I had to believe and hope that they will be "Imandar Baiman" (Honorable Crooks) and once after accepting the money will do the work. I had to wait the whole day for a call and after not receiving it I was at the police station that evening. When I entered they smiled and showed me the phone. OoooH so great to see her again.

Congratulations: I was asked to write an application to stop the investigation. I was specifically asked to THANK and CONGRATULATE the police department to find it. Although I had already penned it down without their asking because I was thankful. But I couldn't help but smile when that guy asked me to. I just underlined those lines again :). I also mentioned that the phone is missing the memory card, stylus and cover. But I am happy for the rest. Later he was trying to explain how they recovered it and who had it in broken hindi and frequently mixed with Kannad (which I don't know). As I was not much interested I did not ask for further explanation. I thanked them again and left. I was happy the police department does work, against the general claims I have heard, although crookedly.

Prevent Mobile Loss

Found my love my mobile

As I have mentioned earlier in the post "She broke up with me" my love, my mobile was lost in an auto rickshaw while commuting to office. Thanks to the prayers I & you made I am back again with her :). We did meet again. The breakup didn't last long. Hope it doesn't ever happen again.

The burning question that everybody is asking me now:

How to get lost / stolen mobile back?

When you search the net for lost mobile you will find thousands of links and pages, but very few posts from people who recovered it.

One of the reason I got mobile back is because I was very well prepared that this crisis might occur. Other reasons are chance and luck, which are beyond our control but the following things should be taken care of.

First: When you buy a mobile, keep your bills safe. Don't throw them away. Make sure your Bills are duly stamped and should contain your name, manufacturer name, model name and Product / Serial Number of your mobile. Keep all the manuals warranty etc that come along they are helpful although not for recovery.

Second: Take a note of your IMEI ( International Mobile Equipment Identity ) number. Its usually found printed on the phone under the battery along with the serial number. It is a unique number assigned to each mobile equipment. This number is unique to the device and has no relation to the SIM (Subscriber Identity Module) which stores the IMSI (International Mobile Subscriber Identity) and hence to sevice provider. It was introduced mainly to control mobile thefts. The logic used for tracking is as follows. Whenever a mobile connects to a GSM networks (IMEI is only for GSM networks) along with the SIM number and other information the mobile also transfers the IMEI number to identify itself as a valid device.
Now when a mobile is stolen or is to be tracked as who is using it, a alert can be placed on the IMEI number. The next time the number comes on the network it is identified as a invalid device and the alert is triggered on it with all the details i.e., the phone number / sim number etc, from where the person's address who is using the SIM etc can be found. A point to note here is that although most of the countries follow this standard and have laws implementing IMEI number for mobile devices, some countries although, like Singapore etc don't have such laws and there are devices without IMEI number. There are even techniques to remove/tamper the IMEI number of mobile equipments. But this techniques are against the law in many countries and require high skill and understanding. Its basically like a hack and proficient people can do it. More on IMEI number here.

Third: Although this wont help you find your mobile but will help you mitigate the loss, get an insurance on it. In many countries getting an insurance is a general practice while buying mobile. If your device is costly why not take it.

Fourth: Try and get a backup of all your data i.e., keep synchronising your device with your laptop or whatever. The activesync on windows mobile takes care of backing up your contacts, calendar appointments, E-mail, Tasks, Notes, Favourites, some files and other media. You can use some other Sync softwares which can keep your storage / memory card in sync. Make an habit of connecting your device to laptop (bluetooth sync is hasselfree).

Fifth: There are software which can be installed on the devices supporting multimedia i.e., having PC connectivity installed with OS as Windows Mobile, Symbian, Palm OS etc. There are only a few of these software which I am going to tell you about. These software are again a kind of hack and tampering done to track SIM card change. The logic of this software is simple. There is predefined configurable mobile number stored on your device (like in the mobile registry) which will be notified by a SMS, being sent in the background with the information like the new SIM number and mobile number inserted. Some more sophisticated softwares also insert the GPS coordinates of the mobile when sending the SMS, provided your device had GPS installed on it. So you can find out the person yourself who did this to you. You may find some free software look for them. This point may not be applicable to many of you and I admit its a bit geeky.

Sixth: Take Care Period.

Well I took care of most of the above points but I could not install these software on my device because of the performance tweak I did a few days before losing it. When I was talking about the performance tweak in the last post I was talking about this. The tweak basically was that I had formated my Windows mobile 6.0 and installed windows mobile 6.1 and along with that changed my IPL and SPL ( more of it on someother day if interested get started here). It freed a lot of locked memory on my device. So basically after doing it I did not install these software and the next day the mobile was lost.

Its basically like a stitch in time saves nine. So any precaution that you can take is good. With this all done you might not even lose your mobile. And if you lose it chances are that you will be back with your love as I am.

continued in...

So now how to Recover Lost mobile?

.

She broke up with Me !

So they say, every love comes to an end. Or does it?

I thought otherwise until it happened to me. Or did it?

Is it the end of the relationship? Or is it just a breakup and we will meet again. I hope we do.

We had a year long relationship. One Year and 7 days to be precise. Its the time when I came to this city in south. We had a really good time together for like 3-4 months then I kind of didn't pay that much attention, got busy with other stuff. But for the few weeks I had only my beautiful Elf in mind. The relationship was back strong. I was too happy with her for the few days. It was kind of a performance tweak. And then this huge blow, suddenly without even saying a good bye :(.

What happened? What went wrong?

Some might say that I cheated but thats not the thing. I paid equal attention to both of them, Gharwali and Baharwali. And I am sure they both knew that too. They had a great ActiveSync partnership working between them. I guess losing a baharwali is more difficult.

Well thats how they(my friends) say... my lappy T42 is my Gharwali for enjoying at home, and P3450 my Baharwali for outdoors. Yes, my HTC Touch P3450 codename Elf has left me, or I can say the Big Bastard world came between us.

So let me tell you the story, So that I dont have to tell it over and over again.

It happened today, the cloudy weather outside made a way into my life. I as usual woke up late and started for my office. On the way I found an auto and the guy asking 20 Rs extra on the metered fare. I argued and got it settled to 10 Rs. extra. Well everything was usual daily routine until now. When I got down at office, while taking out my wallet I kept the Elf on my bag beside me. Then there was this problem of change of 100Rs. I came out and asked a colleague who was passing by. He gave me the money I gave it to the Auto driver and took the bag and left. I pulled the bag from the handle without looking so he mobile dropped over there. I went upstairs and realised, started calling the number nobody picked it, then somebody started rejecting the call and then switched it off. Well I and you kinda knew this was going to happen.

Well rest you know what I had to do, called customer care barred outgoing calls. Went to customer care office got a duplicate SIM card. Went to police station with the IMEI number filed the complaint.

Now I seriously hope that the good guys of the Police Dept find her out. Otherwise, I am stuck here with a company provided Nokia 1100, Oh my god !!

Well for those who dont know HTC Touch product code name is ELF. If properly tweaked she runs like hell :). Wish the breakup gets over and we are back together. Hope you add a prayer for me.