Near the top of my list of things that keep me up at night is a lost smartphone. My little pocket computer goes with me everywhere so misplacing it, damaging it beyond repair, or even someone stealing it is going to happen eventually.
Not only would losing a smartphone be a huge inconvenience, for sex workers it's also a matter of lost income when they can't be contacted. On top of that, there's loads of juicy data on a sex worker's smartphone that nobody wants to become public!
Considering how much of a pain it would be to have your smartphone lost, broken or stolen, it makes sense to plan what to do when that ill-fated day arrives.
Financially, you can have a few hundred bucks set aside for repairs or a new phone and there's even insurance specifically for smartphones these days. The real headache is getting all the data and information stored on the phone safely onto a new device and making sure the old device is a useless brick for anyone else that might lay their hands on it.
Get ready for losing your phone
Here are six things you can do before you lose your phone so that when it happens, life won't be so difficult:
- Turn on lost device tracking
- Enable backups
- Use a password manager
- Turn on lost device security features
- Use a screen lock PIN/passcode
- Record multi-factor authentication backup codes
The good news is that these features are enabled by default on most Apple and Android smartphones, so chances are you're already using them, but it won't hurt to double check they're all enabled, understand why they're so important and come to terms with the unique risks of using them as a sex worker.
Turn on Find My/Find Hub
Google has a handy support document titled "Be ready to find a lost Android device" that outlines all the things you need to do in order to find, track and remotely lock/wipe your Android device should the need arise. Apple has a similar document titled "Set up Find My on your iPhone, iPad or Mac" that explains how to enable Apple's location, locking and remote wipe features.
Enable backups
If you'd like to keep the stuff on your phone, then backups are super important. This means when you get a new phone you can put it back just how you had things on your old phone without spending hours to set everything up again. It also restores your messages, contacts, photos and other data. Instructions to enable backups on your iPhone are on Apple's website and to enable backups on your Android phone, Google has all the info you need.
Use a password manager
We've got a handy post on the Tryst.link blog all about password managers that if you haven't already checked out you really should! By storing all your secrets in a password manager, when your phone goes missing, the accounts you're logged into on the phone aren't lost, you just re-download the apps on your new phone and log in to each one again. 1Password is an excellent password manager if you aren't already using one.
Lock your phone with a PIN/passcode
It can be tempting to use 0000 or simply disable the PIN on your phone, but this is probably the most important thing you can do to prevent anyone accessing the data on your phone, including the cops, should your phone go missing. You probably already have one setup, but if you don't, here's instructions for Google Android and Apple iOS. If you want a bit of extra security, you can set a password instead of a PIN. This makes it way harder to guess the PIN or "brute-force" access to the device.
Record all your multi-factor authentication backup codes
You might have all your passwords backed up nicely in a password manager but if you can't log in to any accounts because they're asking for a multi-factor authentication token that happened to be on the phone you no longer have access to, oof, welcome to hell. Most services have backup codes (also called emergency codes, reset codes or seed tokens) you were asked to write down and keep safe when you set up your multi-factor authentication. It's an excellent idea to check if you have them somewhere you can access if your smartphone isn't available.
Being risk aware
Sex workers have to be extra careful with things like iCloud and Google as unlike the normies, depending where you live and what you're up to, enabling these features exposes you and your clients to additional risk. Backups for example - if they are not encrypted there's a chance someone you don't like will find those backups and go sniffing through them.
Lost device features by their nature, share the location of your device and by association, the location of you, with Apple or Google so that when your phone goes missing they can show you on a map where it is. By being logged in to their cloud services, even with this feature turned off, data is sent containing your location to their servers. Once they have that data, who can access it is out of your control.
Apple has a feature called Advanced Data Protection for iCloud. It turns on end-to-end encryption (check out this Tryst.link blog post to learn why end-to-end encryption is awesome) for your iCloud account. This results in nobody (not even Apple according to their documentation), being able to read the data contained in your iCloud account. That includes device backups. Google doesn't have an equivalent and admits that only "some" of your data is end-to-end encrypted.
Uh-oh, it happened! My smartphone is gone
Both Apple and Google have easy to read and detailed documents on what to do if you lose your smartphone and should be the first thing you read:
- Google - How to Find, Secure or Erase A Lost Android Device
- Apple - If Your iPhone or iPad Has Been Stolen
With Google's Find Hub and Apple's Find My networks, you are able to look at where the phone currently is or if it's run out of battery or doesn't have network connectivity, its last location.
As Google and Apple's documents explain, marking the device as lost means the device is locked and the only way to unlock it is for you to log into iCloud or Google again and mark the device as found. A good idea if you think someone knows your PIN and might find your phone before you do. This also prevents anyone wiping the iPhone and trying to log in to their iCloud or Google account to claim it as theirs.
Be aware of scams where the people that stole your phone then try to contact you pretending to be Apple or Google, pleading and begging for the device's PIN or your password so they can return the device. Apple and Google will never do this! These scammers want this info so they can unlock your device, remove your account and then sell the device.
If all hope of reclaiming your smartphone is lost, remotely wipe it. This nukes all the data on the device so even if someone manages to get hold of your PIN or iCloud/Google account, they at least won't find anything on the phone.
- Google - How to Find, Secure or Erase A Lost Android Device
- Apple - Erase a Device in Find Devices on iCloud.com
Finally, you'll need to contact your telecommunications provider (telco) and tell them you've lost your phone which has your SIM card inside. This is really important as without the SIM card you've also lost your phone number! By telling your telco you've lost the SIM, they can provide you with a new SIM card ASAP that you can pop into your new phone and cancel the old one so nobody goes around using your phone number.
New phone, now what?
Sorry about your old phone. May it find peace from the hell of cyberspace in which it resided for all its life. RIP old phone.
If you've turned on backups earlier then the process of getting your stuff onto a new device is straightforward. Apple and Google have documentation on what to do next:
- Apple - Restore your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch from a backup
- Google - Restore data on your Android device
Once you've finished setting up the new phone, you can then install your password manager (if you aren't using Apple or Google's default password manager) and re-install your multi-factor authentication app. If you aren't using a multi-factor authentication app that backs up to the cloud - most do, but not all! - you'll need to dig out all those backup codes you kept in a safe place and use them to log in to all the services you had on your old phone.
Preparation is key
The longest bit of this blog post was the part where we got everything ready before the phone was lost and the shortest section is what to do when you get a new phone. I know it might be a challenge to get everything sorted ahead of time, it certainly feels like one, but it really is the only way to avoid getting locked out of all your accounts and potentially having data stored on your phone stolen or used against you.
By enabling backups, using a password manager, setting up lost device features, securing your phone with a proper PIN, and keeping multi-factor authentication backup codes safe - you're building yourself a safety net for when your smartphone inevitably goes missing. Future you will be thanking past you when you're not scrambling around trying to remember passwords or losing clients because you can't be reached. Let’s be nice to our future selves and get this sorted early.
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