I'm currently working at a sandwich joint in Garden Grove, near my house, and there was this Samsung A51 phone that has been there for over 8 months now, apparently someone left it in the bathroom awhile back and never came back to claim it, so the manager challenged everyone to unlock it, whoever unlocks it, keeps it, simple ja? Well, it was a 3 x 3 dot lock, and there are over 200,000 answers to crack it, so he gave it to me because everyone gave up on attempting to unlock it. Upon bringing it home, I erased the entire data, in case I might unlock it and accidently stumble upon the previous owner's data. I then went around on Youtube on how to unlock it (since the original owner's Sprint SIM card is still on there, and his/her pin), and I got nothing. So now, I'm left with a clean phone with the previous owner's lock on it, and I'm trying to unlock it so I can clean off their data so I can claim it (Since I could use a new phone anyway), note, I've already did a hard reset on it, so there is no trace of the original owner's data on it except their pin and gmail on it. Is there anyway I can unlock it, and 100 percent clean it so I can claim it? Thanks
-Nguyen
I'm not going to help you unlock that. Maybe someone else will? I'm not trying to give you a hard time, but here's my 2¢ about this.
Personally I wouldn't keep the phone, and I definitely wouldn't try activating it. If the original owner reported it stolen, then police will be knocking on your door within a few hours of trying to activate it. The honest thing to do, and what someone should've done 8 months ago, is turn the phone over to a Sprint store. They would've been able to contact the owner and get it back to them. The owner probably didn't come looking for it because they didn't remember that they left it there, or it was stolen from them. I also think it's really sh*tty to wipe someone else's device. Very important information or irreplaceable data could've been on it. Not everyone backs up their data on a regular basis. Again, I'm really not trying to give you a hard time. I understand why you did it, and I've been guilty of doing the same in my younger years. I just want you to know, there's much better ways to handle this kind of thing in the future.
Spaceminer said:
I'm not going to help you unlock that. Maybe someone else will? I'm not trying to give you a hard time, but here's my 2¢ about this.
Personally I wouldn't keep the phone, and I definitely wouldn't try activating it. If the original owner reported it stolen, then police will be knocking on your door within a few hours of trying to activate it. The honest thing to do, and what someone should've done 8 months ago, is turn the phone over to a Sprint store. They would've been able to contact the owner and get it back to them. The owner probably didn't come looking for it because they didn't remember that they left it there, or it was stolen from them. I also think it's really sh*tty to wipe someone else's device. Very important information or irreplaceable data could've been on it. Not everyone backs up their data on a regular basis. Again, I'm really not trying to give you a hard time. I understand why you did it, and I've been guilty of doing the same in my younger years. I just want you to know, there's much better ways to handle this kind of thing in the future.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Eaiser said than done. I'm gonna return it though, knowing the fact the police wouldn't knock on my door, considering the manager left it on for awhile and everyone attempting to unlock it already, now then, how do I explain to them I wiped out one of their phone's hard drive clean? I tell them I found it like that or sumthin?
LiskNova said:
Eaiser said than done. I'm gonna return it though, knowing the fact the police wouldn't knock on my door, considering the manager left it on for awhile and everyone attempting to unlock it already, now then, how do I explain to them I wiped out one of their phone's hard drive clean? I tell them I found it like that or sumthin?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I wouldn't say anything. Just drop it off and say that it was left at your work. They only know as much as you tell them. ;-)
Spaceminer said:
I wouldn't say anything. Just drop it off and say that it was left at your work. They only know as much as you tell them. ;-)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Okay, one more thing before I actually give it to them, awhile back, I put on my gmail as an attempt to link it with the phone, and once I realized nothing can be done, I did a hard reset, any way my gmail is still linked to the phone, or its still clean without any traces of my info on it?
LiskNova said:
Okay, one more thing before I actually give it to them, awhile back, I put on my gmail as an attempt to link it with the phone, and once I realized nothing can be done, I did a hard reset, any way my gmail is still linked to the phone, or its still clean without any traces of my info on it?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It's a lot easier to be a straight shooter... hope you learned something from this
LiskNova said:
Okay, one more thing before I actually give it to them, awhile back, I put on my gmail as an attempt to link it with the phone, and once I realized nothing can be done, I did a hard reset, any way my gmail is still linked to the phone, or its still clean without any traces of my info on it?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You should be fine.
Related
My girlfriend liked my HTC Amaze and bugged me until I bought her one. It was a used Amaze I found on Craigslist. It has worked fine for almost a year. She's been having some really weird problems with it and I was planning to dig into fixing it for her. HOWEVER, night before last she dropped the dang phone in a cup of soda. She did get it out almost immediately and took it apart and dried everything off. I'm not too sure she let the phone dry very long, I wasn't there.
Now the phone boots just fine and all the apps appear to work. However, it gets NO BARS. It doesn't matter where we are. I can have 5 bars and 4G connection and her phone shows nadda. So we took the phone in to T-Mobile for some help. The guy was a lot of help and spend a lot of time working with the phone. He even switched sim cards. But eventually he discovered that the phone has been rooted. DANG!!!! So that got dropped quick. Now I have to figure this out for myself.
I really need some suggestions. Obviously the antenna has been affected, right? I have done my research and have learned that the phone actually connects to the back cover to obtain a connection. So I will be double checking that as soon as I get my hands on the phone again. What else should I do?
The android version is now v2.?. We've been trying to update it to v4 and it never would download. Now we know why. I want to restore the phone back to the stock configuration and upgrade the OS but there's no use in that unless I can take care of the connection problem.
Please, please, please someone help me. Otherwise I'll have to go out and buy a new Galaxy III for her. I can't afford that right now.
TallRiderKy said:
My girlfriend liked my HTC Amaze and bugged me until I bought her one. It was a used Amaze I found on Craigslist. It has worked fine for almost a year. She's been having some really weird problems with it and I was planning to dig into fixing it for her. HOWEVER, night before last she dropped the dang phone in a cup of soda. She did get it out almost immediately and took it apart and dried everything off. I'm not too sure she let the phone dry very long, I wasn't there.
Now the phone boots just fine and all the apps appear to work. However, it gets NO BARS. It doesn't matter where we are. I can have 5 bars and 4G connection and her phone shows nadda. So we took the phone in to T-Mobile for some help. The guy was a lot of help and spend a lot of time working with the phone. He even switched sim cards. But eventually he discovered that the phone has been rooted. DANG!!!! So that got dropped quick. Now I have to figure this out for myself.
I really need some suggestions. Obviously the antenna has been affected, right? I have done my research and have learned that the phone actually connects to the back cover to obtain a connection. So I will be double checking that as soon as I get my hands on the phone again. What else should I do?
The android version is now v2.?. We've been trying to update it to v4 and it never would download. Now we know why. I want to restore the phone back to the stock configuration and upgrade the OS but there's no use in that unless I can take care of the connection problem.
Please, please, please someone help me. Otherwise I'll have to go out and buy a new Galaxy III for her. I can't afford that right now.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
lol your title sounds a lil hahaha anyway all the signal antenna's are in the back door so try a new backdoor?? mite work ther're plenty in ebay
You can try a new back cover, but tbh, my guess is that it's probably not the problem. When it got wet it probably shorted something out or something. You have to take the battery out immediately, every .01 seconds count. And i wouldnt put the battery back in for like 2 days. Whenever mine gets wet I take out the battery then I try and suck out all of the water or whatever liquid out of the device as I can. Then ill let it sit in the sun for a while. I always waut at least 24 hourse before putting it back I
aj_2423 said:
You can try a new back cover, but tbh, my guess is that it's probably not the problem. When it got wet it probably shorted something out or something. You have to take the battery out immediately, every .01 seconds count. And i wouldnt put the battery back in for like 2 days. Whenever mine gets wet I take out the battery then I try and suck out all of the water or whatever liquid out of the device as I can. Then ill let it sit in the sun for a while. I always wait at least 24 hourse before putting it back I
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah, that's certainly what I would have done. Unfortunately I wasn't there when it happened. She claims she immediately got it out. But she was falling asleep when it fell in so I really don't know. She did immediately take it apart and dry it off. But I don't think she was so anxious about it she put it back together to see if it would work. That probably did more damage than getting it wet in the first place.
We both have the same phone. I took the back off my Amaze and still have a good signal. It may have dropped one bar but not completely. It may get a boost on the signal from the back cover but it still works without. So I agree it probably is not going to be fixed by simply replacing the back cover. I'm going to stick my back cover on it this evening just to see what happens, but I think I know.
I am going to research the possibility of replacing the antenna completely. It seems the next logical option. I may also go ahead and take it further apart just to give it the opportunity to dry out. We'll see.
Any further comments or suggestions are greatly appreciated.
ravike14 said:
lol your title sounds a lil hahaha anyway all the signal antenna's are in the back door so try a new backdoor?? mite work ther're plenty in ebay
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You are absolutely right!! LOL.. If it weren't for the cost of replacing the danged thing I would still be laughing. Why is it she wants ME to replace it and hasn't even suggested that SHE should be the one to replace it THIS TIME?????? She is on one of those pay as you go accounts. We were ready to set her up with a 2-year deal just to find they don't exist at T-Mobile any more. You pay full price for any phone now regardless of what sort of account you set up. I don't see doing that for quite a while.
I may be searching eBay for a replacement phone. But I'd like to try a few options with this one first.
Clean the contacts
TallRiderKy said:
You are absolutely right!! LOL.. If it weren't for the cost of replacing the danged thing I would still be laughing. Why is it she wants ME to replace it and hasn't even suggested that SHE should be the one to replace it THIS TIME?????? She is on one of those pay as you go accounts. We were ready to set her up with a 2-year deal just to find they don't exist at T-Mobile any more. You pay full price for any phone now regardless of what sort of account you set up. I don't see doing that for quite a while.
I may be searching eBay for a replacement phone. But I'd like to try a few options with this one first.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
if she dropped it in soda, get some rubbing alcohol and a q-tip. clean the contacts very thoroughly. the soda is sticky and can prevent proper contact,
also clean the SIM card contacts on both the card and the phone.
Working Now
I cleaned the back of the phone and the cover this morning with rubbing alcohol then stuck my SIM and SD cards in the phone this morning and turned it on. To my amazement it is now working. What a great sigh of relief!!!!! I have heard nothing but moaning and groaning over this cheap phone I bought my girl until I could resolve this.
So it's off to phase 2 of this adventure. According to the T-Mobile store this phone has been rooted. I've read about it but I know close to nothing about rooting phones. There seems to be as many DIY pages describing how to root or restore a cell phone I am a bit reluctant to get started.
What do I need to look for in restoring this phone? Do I have to find the restore file that matches the Android version on the phone or can I just get the absolute latest one? Which one of these abundance of instructional should I be looking for? What is this about S-On/S-Off? It seems to be important. How do I actually check to verify that this phone has been rooted? I'm just going by someone's comments here.
I'd like to get this completed today. I'm expecting SIGNIFICANT appreciation this evening if I can hand her a working smart phone!!!!
My most enthusiastic and humble appreciation to those who responded. :good:
Been doing some investigations. The phone has super user installed in the aps. It also has 4ext installed. I let the phone download the latest ICS but the install failed.
According to "most" off the forums I have read all I have to do is place the stock image on the root of the external SD card and reboot. Is there anything else I need to worry about?
TallRiderKy said:
Been doing some investigations. The phone has super user installed in the aps. It also has 4ext installed. I let the phone download the latest ICS but the install failed.
According to "most" off the forums I have read all I have to do is place the stock image on the root of the external SD card and reboot. Is there anything else I need to worry about?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If your s off just run a ruu and latest firmware then 4ext and flash supersu then you'll have a stable phone
Sent from my HTC_Amaze_4G using xda premium
Okay, so it's a bit of a long story but there's a woman I work with who had her virtually-new Samsung Galaxy S3 stolen by her recently-split husband last year. We all knew it was him, but we had virtually no evidence, other than it's disappearance. Anyway, so this woman recently was in his now-separated husband's flat & was rooting around. She found a Samsung Galaxy S3, smartly took a picture of the IMEI & left it. She knew it was hers, but wanted to be 100% sure. She went home, checked the box, & of course they did match. The next day, she went back to his house & manipulated the situation so that she could find enough time on her own to go take the phone back without him knowing. So she brings it into work with her the next day. The problem is, the phone now has a password lock on it. She then spent the night trying to guess the password, but to no success.
So, me being the tech guy that I am, she asked me to try to get into it. I said, the easiest way would be for me to wipe it & factory reset it, but that she would lose all of her information. She doesn't want me to do that. She wants to get pictures & stuff of her / their kids off the phone, as well as look into who her ex-husband had been talking to / see who knew about him stealing the phone. So, I said it should be possible. However, I'm not a hugely great phone guy. I'm good with computers, but not so much phones.
So, we spent the day trying various exploits found on Google or YouTube but to no success. There was one method where we had a little success where we turned the phone on > Emergency Call > Emergency Contact > Press Home > Press Power > Unlocked home screen in then meant to appear. It never did. Although we could get it to quickly flash whatever was on the home screen (which was a picture of her / their kids, which she'd set to the phone before it was taken).
So without any of those methods working, I'm tasked with now getting into the phone at home. I have no idea whether USB debugging is enabled, I would assume not. We are unable to reset the password via Google Recovery or anything because we're never offered the option. As I say, she doesn't want me to wipe the phone. But there has to be a way to get into it otherwise, either through brute force, or one of those other password cracking methods possibly?
There was a technique I found on Google at work, something about connecting the phone to your computer via USB then trying to do some stuff from command line or through a Linux distro, which I need to re-find & try.
But alas, does anyone here have any methods or know any ways that I could get around this password lock?
I have to say though, I'm glad it's not that simple (atleast it appears so, anyway) to get around one of these passwords. Makes me feel a little safer for my own Galaxy S3! haha
Hey
You said u tried the Google account method right?
If that's not working try to flash philz recovery and from that you can access the contents of the internal SD card..
U can also TRY to use the custom back up option offered by his recovery and then custom restore the data..
I can't assure you that it will work but you can try it..
Best of Luck
-tchindalia
Sent from my GT-I9300 using xda app-developers app
We did not try a Google account method, I don't think? Think we tried to log in to the ex-husband's Google account on my iPad for some reason (can't remember why now tbh) but we could not guess his password. He's apparently changed it since they split.
Won't flashing the phone wipe everything that's on it?
Hey
Not if your just flashing a recovery..
Just youtube for some videos on this...
I had see one some time back..
Sent from my GT-I9300 using xda app-developers app
Benaholic said:
Okay, so it's a bit of a long story but there's a woman I work with who had her virtually-new Samsung Galaxy S3 stolen by her recently-split husband last year. We all knew it was him, but we had virtually no evidence, other than it's disappearance. Anyway, so this woman recently was in his now-separated husband's flat & was rooting around. She found a Samsung Galaxy S3, smartly took a picture of the IMEI & left it. She knew it was hers, but wanted to be 100% sure. She went home, checked the box, & of course they did match. The next day, she went back to his house & manipulated the situation so that she could find enough time on her own to go take the phone back without him knowing. So she brings it into work with her the next day. The problem is, the phone now has a password lock on it. She then spent the night trying to guess the password, but to no success.
So, me being the tech guy that I am, she asked me to try to get into it. I said, the easiest way would be for me to wipe it & factory reset it, but that she would lose all of her information. She doesn't want me to do that. She wants to get pictures & stuff of her / their kids off the phone, as well as look into who her ex-husband had been talking to / see who knew about him stealing the phone. So, I said it should be possible. However, I'm not a hugely great phone guy. I'm good with computers, but not so much phones.
So, we spent the day trying various exploits found on Google or YouTube but to no success. There was one method where we had a little success where we turned the phone on > Emergency Call > Emergency Contact > Press Home > Press Power > Unlocked home screen in then meant to appear. It never did. Although we could get it to quickly flash whatever was on the home screen (which was a picture of her / their kids, which she'd set to the phone before it was taken).
So without any of those methods working, I'm tasked with now getting into the phone at home. I have no idea whether USB debugging is enabled, I would assume not. We are unable to reset the password via Google Recovery or anything because we're never offered the option. As I say, she doesn't want me to wipe the phone. But there has to be a way to get into it otherwise, either through brute force, or one of those other password cracking methods possibly?
There was a technique I found on Google at work, something about connecting the phone to your computer via USB then trying to do some stuff from command line or through a Linux distro, which I need to re-find & try.
But alas, does anyone here have any methods or know any ways that I could get around this password lock?
I have to say though, I'm glad it's not that simple (atleast it appears so, anyway) to get around one of these passwords. Makes me feel a little safer for my own Galaxy S3! haha
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
If he lets her into the house so easily then:
1- HE didn't steal the phone because he felt no need to hide it
2- The "woman" is invading the guy's privacy and checking personal info without consent
3- Seeing who he talked to is a typical behaviour pattern of someone who is invading someone's privacy for ill intentions
4- the "woman" can always request for the guy to share the kid's photos and other stuff. No need to snoop around
To the OP:
If you do help this person break into the phone and turns out it wasn't hers, then you are aiding in a possibly criminal activity.
If he did steal, then all the best to you. Otherwise; Beware of the LAW.
~ RazorMC
RazorMC said:
If he lets her into the house so easily then:
1- HE didn't steal the phone because he felt no need to hide it
2- The "woman" is invading the guy's privacy and checking personal info without consent
3- Seeing who he talked to is a typical behaviour pattern of someone who is invading someone's privacy for ill intentions
4- the "woman" can always request for the guy to share the kid's photos and other stuff. No need to snoop around
To the OP:
If you do help this person break into the phone and turns out it wasn't hers, then you are aiding in a possibly criminal activity.
If he did steal, then all the best to you. Otherwise; Beware of the LAW.
~ RazorMC
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
OP alr said the imei matched so the phone is the woman's. Unless tat was a lie.
To the OP, have u tried samsung's "find my mobile"?
Sent from my GT-I9300 using xda app-developers app
JellyYogurt said:
OP alr said the imei matched so the phone is the woman's. Unless tat was a lie.
To the OP, have u tried samsung's "find my mobile"?
Sent from my GT-I9300 using xda app-developers app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Like I said, if it was indeed stolen, then I wish the OP luck.
I'm just curious why the person never approached the police with proof of ownership instead of trying to bypass the security.
Cheers :good:
~ RazorMC
RazorMC said:
Like I said, if it was indeed stolen, then I wish the OP luck.
I'm just curious why the person never approached the police with proof of ownership instead of trying to bypass the security.
Cheers :good:
~ RazorMC
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I can't remember the reason she believed the phone was stolen, to be honest. The reason she had access to his house, was because they have kids together. She had gone to go drop the kids off, or pick them up. For some bizarre reason, I don't know why, he left her in the house alone after he went to take them to school (telling her to lock the door when she leaves). She took that opportunity to look around the house for the phone, as he'd never previously admitted to taking it but she was sure he did.
She found the phone, took a picture of the IMEI, went home to match to the IMEI on her box & it saw that they were the same. She's shown me the picture as well. confirming that it was indeed her phone, she then went back to her ex's flat the next day (because he was going to come along to their daughter's birthday). Just as they were about to leave, she says she needs the toilet. So, she runs back upstairs & grabs the phone without him knowing.
I think the reason why she never went to the police about it is because he was trying to get citizenship to remain here in the country, & she didn't want something like this to jeopardize whether she's in a relationship with him or not; they do still have kids together. Sending him back to Kenya over a phone wouldn't do anyone any good.
JellyYogurt said:
OP alr said the imei matched so the phone is the woman's. Unless tat was a lie.
To the OP, have u tried samsung's "find my mobile"?
Sent from my GT-I9300 using xda app-developers app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Which "Find my mobile" thing are you on about?
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I appear to have found a way to bypass the lock screen via the ADB, but I think it only works for a lock pattern. Anyone know or have any ideas what to do for a password?
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2237382
For hours now I've been trying alsorts of stuff, from doing things via terminal, trying to do things through recovery, & alsorts to no success. However, I did find one solution that worked:
http://forum.gsmhosting.com/vbb/f77...-pin-reset-no-root-no-usb-debug-free-1722271/
Was posted here on XDA Developers as well, but the thread was closed. Many virus programs do immediately notify that the program contains viruses / trojans, but not sure if they're false positives? Anyway, disabled AVG & it worked like a charm! So, if anyone else needs similar help, maybe try this?
Alas, suppose this thread can be closed now.
^^ That malware had stopped working and that is why it was closed on other site as well.
~ RazorMC
This is a saga. I had a very long six hours with Pixel support yesterday. Phone is on Verizon. Sorry if some of this is text speak, it's adapted from telling a buddy and reddit about this mess.
So. My camera has been kinda ****ed up for a month or so. I talked to google support about it a while ago but kinda took a break from dealing with it. I have deduced that it is clearly a hardware issue. The camera makes a loud clicking noise when it tries to focus, very rarely actually does focus. The last step in Google troubleshooting before they will warranty it is a factory reset. I said I didn't wanna because it was obviously a hardware issue but my guy said I had to, I should have just lied, but I didn't think of it. So before I reset, I wanted to have everything backed up, which it wasn't, apparently. So to speed things along and not have to wait for it to sync itself, I forced the backup using adb. Made sure it was completed, though. And I can see the backup on Google Drive right now and could then. So then I do the reset.
The phone comes back, my instructions were to skip the startup and test the camera. Obvs doesn't work because it was a hardware issue, but now I wanna reset my phone. Go through the wizard. "No backup found." Ask my camera guy what I should do, he said it glitches sometimes, just do another reset after we're done setting up for me to return the phone maybe. Don't wanna do that right away cuz I'm going away, but I have a while to do it. So I do the second reset and do the wizard right at startup. Still no backup. I call back for a different tech, who has me reset through the bootloader. Still no backup. At that point, I ask if there is someone who can walk me through the commands to force a restore with adb. He says his supervisor could, he'll be back and call me in an hour.
90 minutes pass. I receive no call. I call back looking for my specialist. Get some other dude whom I walk back through the problem with screen sharing on. Takes him a while to get the lay of the land, which is, again, the backup exists, I can see it, for some reason my phone setup cannot, I would like my full phone setup back and not just my ****ing photos. "Ok, we can try transferring you to a manager." Yes. That is what I wanted before. Get another guy who I am not sure is actually a manager. Spend like 15 minutes trying to make him understand the issue and again saying please just give me someone with some familiarity of developer tools who can walk me through some commands real quick. I have a new troubleshooting step he says! Great! He tells me it. Then I went from annoyed to mad. Mind you in between all these calls, I've been getting that 30 seconds of Vivaldi looped on end. He suggests we try putting it in safe mode and letting it sit for half an hour to make sure no apps are interfering. I tried to explain to him that this is pointless, that the whole problem is that THERE ARE NO APPS, IT'S FACTORY FRESH, what would this solve. He tries to say we're just troubleshooting and have to go through it and why safe mode checks things. I said again, I'm clearly not a complete novice, I understand the thing we're doing, I am explaining to you right now why you are having me do it and why it is a pointless step, can we move onto the next one, please. The call drops. He may have just hung up on me because he realized I wasn't happy with his horrible pointless idea.
I call back and this time, through some more Vivaldi, get fairly straight through to a manager. This one at least seems to grasp the issue. He doesn't know how to fix it. No one there knows anything at all about how to use any developer tools, and we've officially established my level of technical literacy is higher than the people meant to help me, if not high enough to get myself out of this mess. There is no one higher to escalate this too, but we can be transferred to the Drive department. Sure. More Vivaldi. Get my guy. At least this time he seems to be on the same continent. Has no idea why I was transferred to him, this is not something in their wheelhouse at all, he'll try one thing, and oh, by the way, I don't own a cell phone yuk yuk yuk. Seems kinda wild for a Google tech support guy not to have a cell, but that's just me. His one thing doesn't work. He has no idea why android support rolled me around the way they did all day. See if Verizon might know. btw you wanna take a survey? That's mostly where we are now. Except. For some reason, if you turn off autobackup, it'll delete all existing backups. This is stupid, but also an issue because I neither want my phone to backup and overwrite the backup I know works nor to delete that backup. So now my phone is backing up into another drive where it can't hurt anyone.
Also, I've now warranty'd the phone with Verizon for the camera issue, so hopefully it will just restore easily to the new one, but just in case it doesn't, I'd still like some advice if anyone has any.
Anyway, the question is if anyone knows how to force the thing to restore with adb.
tl;dr: I forced my phone to do a backup with adb, I can see the backup in google drive, but when I try to setup my phone, it won't recognize that it is there. Does anyone know how to solve this, using adb again or otherwise?
Aight so I have this Samsung Galaxy J7 Max that I've been trying to unlock for more than 2 years now. I of course, don't want to lose the super important data it holds. It got locked out randomly and hasn't been able to take up the pattern I had put on it till date. I'm absolutely sure no one changed its lock screen pattern and its the phone that is unable to recognize the exact same password it had before this happening. I got hold of it today and yet again, started looking for solutions on YouTube and the internet itself. After all of my research, one thing is clear. There is only one way that the pattern lock can be removed in such a condition; by deleting this system folder called gesture.key that lies within the phone itself. I am by no means a nerdy software dev or something but I do have very little knowledge about these workarounds. I used an ADB via a cmd terminal to contact my phone. But it turns out that due to my usb debugging setting not being turned on in my phone, the adb didn't have the required authorization to make any changes to the target. I then got my phone into stock recovery mode and chose the Install through ADB option there. Now when I input the command adb devices, the prompt showed me my device ID, but instead of the "unauthorized" indicator beside it, it now had the indicator "sideload". I had no idea of what had to be done when such happens, so I tried the adb shell > cd data/system > su > rm *.key [taken from an XDA forums thread] commands again. But right on the second step it displayed error this time. I have tried using a key eraser via sd card too, but it just doesn't happen, the sd card folder in the stock mode does not display the contents of the folder.
Now the phone isn't being an obstacle in my life right now, but I really hope there's a way to fix it. Early help would be appreciated. Thank You.
If the data is super important why isn't it redundantly backed up?
Having a set lock screen and storing data on the OS is a sure fire way to lose data, eventually.
Maybe you'll get lucky... is that drive encrypted?
If not it may still be corrupted and unusable.
Don't put yourself in this position again... been there, done that
@blackhawk As I said, this was an absolutely random incident, had never even thought this could've been the case someday. Its not like the phone crashed and then this happened, I turned off my phone's display and the next time I woke it up, the pattern wasn't working anymore. Furthermore, the timed attempts that happen after 5 incorrect tries wasn't existing anymore. Now it could be that someone did get the timed attempts wrong as well [it isn't my own phone]. But I really don't see any other reason to that occurrence.
About the backups, I mean cmon, I was 15 back then, a medico student even more so. I never got my hands around backing up anything. But yes, have been backing up every single bit of data within these two years.
The storage drive shouldn't be encrypted. It was a regular phone bought online that had pdfs, images, recordings and videos stored. The google account was not that of the owner either! It was my uncle's account that was being used ever since he bought it. And since there was never a problem having used his account for quite a while, we never cared to change it to a new google account. Now my uncle's google account itself handles another device, his own phone, exact same model, Galaxy J7 Max. I have tried using his account at the Google Find My Device app to locate and unlock the phone that way [I hope you know it has the three options Ring, Secure and Erase Data]. But it happens so that the Secure phone with password option only for devices that have been lost and don't have a security lock already setup, which wasn't, unfortunately, my case. So that option was greyed out.
For the data corruption, you might be correct. But that phone still does receive SMS texts, calls, whatsapp texts and other notifications. They just don't show up on the lock screen anymore. I honestly had the "Screw the data, I'll erase it anyway" thought yesterday, but during my latest tries, I found the XDA forums website to be quite helpful. Had not it been the damn USB debugging, the solution I approached from this forum would've got the job done in a couple minutes. Again, if the data might've gone corrupted, I will erase the data [I mean I would have to]. But this little glimmer of hope that I experienced yesterday is what is preventing me from doing that. I really hope there is a fix to my situation.
@Chinmay47
a phone can get booted into these modes
Normal ( AKA Android OS )
Recovery
Fastboot
Sideload
EDL
Sideload mode is used to flash OTAs and/or ROMs.
Recovery mode allows you to perform some ADB actions as e.g. pull userdata, but this reqires ADB ( read: USB debug ) got enabled.
So my guess is you can't recover phone's userdata at your own, this would have to be done by an external service who can pull out phone's internal SD-card and has the forensic tools to read it.
@jwoegerbauer Surprisingly the idea of taking the phone to a forensic service struck me yesternight too. As you mentioned, since I can't recover the phone's data myself, all tips and tweaks on the web should now be struck off of my list of solutions. I'll leave the data to some forensic services then. Let's hope the recovery is worth the hassle. The thread is still open to more suggestions though. Thanks for the replies everyone. Really appreciate it!
Chinmay47 said:
@jwoegerbauer Surprisingly the idea of taking the phone to a forensic service struck me yesternight too. As you mentioned, since I can't recover the phone's data myself, all tips and tweaks on the web should now be struck off of my list of solutions. I'll leave the data to some forensic services then. Let's hope the recovery is worth the hassle. The thread is still open to more suggestions though. Thanks for the replies everyone. Really appreciate it!
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It not a card they can pull. More than likely it's on a BGA chipset, the hardest kind there is to work with.
If they can't access the data on/with the mobo they will have to unsolder the chipset without damaging it then put it into a test jig or another mobo (after pulling that mobo's matching chipset).
If they can access the data on the mobo, not so bad. Otherwise not so good.
Let us know how this plays out for you.
Here's one I found showing you this complex procedure: https://flashfixers.com/recover-data-dead-phone-chip-off-data-recovery/
They may be able to help you, but I have no personal knowledge of this company.
blackhawk said:
If they can't access the data on/with the mobo they will have to unsolder the chipset without damaging it then put it into a test jig or another mobo (after pulling that mobo's matching chipset).
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Actually thought of this idea right after a couple days from the beginning of the problem. Yes its gonna take loads of precision and patience but it does sound doable. Maybe that's what is gonna be the last option for the forensic service too in case, god forbid, they aren't able to do it the "simple" way. Can't say yet, but I'm gonna keep this thread updated with all the developments that take place.
Chinmay47 said:
Actually thought of this idea right after a couple days from the beginning of the problem. Yes its gonna take loads of precision and patience but it does sound doable. Maybe that's what is gonna be the last option for the forensic service too in case, god forbid, they aren't able to do it the "simple" way. Can't say yet, but I'm gonna keep this thread updated with all the developments that take place.
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If they need to remove the chipset the chances of failure increase. Flash memory retension is generally good for 10+ years but it may be damaged in the removal process if so, snake eyes.
Get price quotes up front for the whole process.
Once they got the phone, they got you by the balls. Not saying they aren't trustworthy but feel them out. If it's a couple hundred and you get the data back, you did good.
No idea of the cost though, my guess is $400-1000+ especially if they need to pull the chipset.
That's high risk even if they do it by the book.
If their policy is no data, no charge... expect higher rates to cover their loses.
@blackhawk All of that sounds kinda terrifying if you ask me. Well I mean, there is always a first option that can be tried without any mentions of pull-aparts. Yet I will surely judge the person well before I hand my device in his hands. I would try my level best to not take it to the critical stage, but if it needs be and there is a really high chance of losing my data, I can factory reset my data at home by myself too can't I? Future shall tell I suppose.
If you factory reset it all data will be lost.
It will not be recoverable!
If you want the data you will need to use a service like I showed you. They will need physical access to the phone to recovery the data.
The phone may be scrape afterwards
@blackhawk Sure does look like it would be! But paying to get your phone reset for you is way to harsher than doing it yourself. It is only in case the data is nearly impossible to recover that I'll reset the phone myself.
Chinmay47 said:
@blackhawk Sure does look like it would be! But paying to get your phone reset for you is way to harsher than doing it yourself. It is only in case the data is nearly impossible to recover that I'll reset the phone myself.
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Reset? Most likely destroyed.
Do you really want the data?
blackhawk said:
Reset? Most likely destroyed.
Do you really want the data?
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I actually do though. But well, if it ain't coming back then why wish for it. Yeah the data was really important.
Chinmay47 said:
I actually do though. But well, if it ain't coming back then why wish for it. Yeah the data was really important.
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Call them up and see what they say.
Since it's not physically damaged they may be able to access it none invasively.
blackhawk said:
Call them up and see what they say.
Since it's not physically damaged they may be able to access it none invasively.
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I'll do that and report back ASAP. Thanks for the help sire!
I have an old AT&T Asus 9020A tablet. I got them new years ago thru my phone plan with AT&T. It wasn’t used much and is like new still.
Anyway, I take care of my mother and she likes games and painting by numbers on her iPad but she broke it and screwed up her charging port. I want to fix this tablet up for her.
I bet it wasn’t used 2 months and was just forgotten….I looked it up and completed a factory reset on it and wiped it clean. So I was trying to set it up and get her to painting again! It’s bout to kill her not having it..lol
I was setting it up and it wants the old email associated that was used to set it up. There is no way to remember that or even get it. I asked my daughter, she don’t remember. Anyway, are there any way I can use (reset) this tablet not knowing the old email that was associated with it? Where I can fix her up for her or am I just wasting my time? Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance!
So it is FRP locked?
Arealhooman said:
So it is FRP locked?
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It’s not locked. It reset ever And started the initial setup as if it was new. It just wants the old gmail for some reason before it will accept the new one. It lets me start in the setting up her account on it but is asking for the old email for verification….. I don’t have it and there is no way to remember it unfortunately. I know they are there to keep folks from stealing them and that’s great. But 10 years later…LOL Is this possible?
what you describe (verify device with google account) is called FRP lock (factory reset protection). this is same on most/all official android devices to render device useless on theft.
however, the unofficial by-pass methods vary for each device model/android version. search on YouTube.