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Friend of mine cannot get into her iPhone (Apple ID issue)

S

Scott M

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Nov 25, 2009
274
68
Hi,

A while ago, a friend of mine wanted to change her Apple ID because the email linked to her previous Apple ID was no longer in use, so she changed it online, using her laptop.

However, today, she plugged her iPhone into her computer, connecting to iTunes, which then threw her phone into recovery mode. Since then, she has been unable to access her iPhone.

When she turns it on, it goes to the activation screen and tells her to sign into the Apple ID linked to the iPhone, but that Apple ID is linked to the email address that is no longer in use AND she cannot remember the password for it either. So basically she is stuck on this activation screen.

Apparently when plugging it into iTunes now, it does the same thing, only on iTunes this time, instead of the computer.

Here are some images:

BvAVtYqIcAAqHDW.jpg


BvAVrtFIgAAPXs3.jpg


Anyone got any ideas?
 
Scott M said:
Hi,

A while ago, a friend of mine wanted to change her Apple ID because the email linked to her previous Apple ID was no longer in use, so she changed it online, using her laptop.

However, today, she plugged her iPhone into her computer, connecting to iTunes, which then threw her phone into recovery mode. Since then, she has been unable to access her iPhone.

When she turns it on, it goes to the activation screen and tells her to sign into the Apple ID linked to the iPhone, but that Apple ID is linked to the email address that is no longer in use AND she cannot remember the password for it either. So basically she is stuck on this activation screen.

Apparently when plugging it into iTunes now, it does the same thing, only on iTunes this time, instead of the computer.

Here are some images:

Image

Image

Anyone got any ideas?
Click to expand...

There is nothing she can do unless she can remember the old password or get it from the password recovery service.

I'm not saying you are, but this could just as easily be someone posting with the same issue after stealing a phone and having it locked by Activation Lock. It's there for a reason so thieves cannot restore the phone as new. There is nothing that can be done to get rid of it.
 
This is going to require either a call to apple or visiting the apple store. Not sure what kind of security credentials she's going to have to verify or bring with her to solve the issue (or if they'll be permitted to help her), but this is your best bet. I've dealt with something similar to this before and a phone call did the trick. Good luck.
 
mojito said:
This is going to require either a call to apple or visiting the apple store. Not sure what kind of security credentials she's going to have to verify or bring with her to solve the issue (or if they'll be permitted to help her), but this is your best bet. I've dealt with something similar to this before and a phone call did the trick. Good luck.
Click to expand...
The Apple store cannot help with Apple IDs. They are limited by corporate policy to help the customer use the iforgot.apple.com website. Besides that they can only advise the customer to call Apple ID support.

The latter isn't really an option in this case as they cannot do anything about an Apple ID locked device.
 
Applejuiced said:
Another case of a lost/stolen iPhone....
Activation lock is great.
Click to expand...

why do people always assume a case of stolen phone?

few days ago a friend of mine wanted to download an app from the appstore, he copied and pasted his apple id password from his notes! i told him please memorize it otherwise if you had to restore for any reason, you will be locked out by icloud lock!

i have all of my family members apple id's on a file on my laptop, because i know, all of them just copy and paste their apple id passwords from notes and they will end up with the above situation if something wrong goes with their phones!
 
nolimit! said:
why do people always assume a case of stolen phone?

few days ago a friend of mine wanted to download an app from the appstore, he copied and pasted his apple id password from his notes! i told him please memorize it otherwise if you had to restore for any reason, you will be locked out by icloud lock!

i have all of my family members apple id's on a file on my laptop, because i know, all of them just copy and paste their apple id passwords from notes and they will end up with the above situation if something wrong goes with their phones!
Click to expand...

Because 99% its what it is.
Oh I forgot my email and I forgot my apple ID password too. I cant get into my phone blah blah blah.....
 
Thanks for the replies, it's all been sorted now. She got in contact with Apple and they were able to remove the old Apple ID for her and let her set up fresh with the new one she made the other day. They said that for some reason, her new email address for her new Apple ID was being used for multiple Apple IDs or something strange like that, which apparently is what caused the problem. I don't know, really. All I know is she's got her phone back up and running, so it's all good.

Noticed some really snide remarks about it being stolen, or something ... egg on your face, much? Apple wouldn't have let her do this without some form of verification, so no, it wasn't a stolen phone.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
dfausty said:
It cannot be done without entering the password. Period. End of discussion.
Click to expand...
Right. Tone is everything. What you didn't hear when you read my words was the sarcasm dripping from my keyboard when I typed that in. :)
 
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