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Found iPhone 4 with passcode - unlock possible?

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cperchard said:
Ok lets be honest here....you blatantly want to keep it.....so why say that you wish you could turn it on so you can "phone someone in their contacts list".......if u were that good a person you would do what you suggested and take it back to apple store so they can possibly find who it's owner is. There would be no thread and that would be the end of story......so bottom line is, u want to hack a phone that isn't yours for your own benefit :p
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If he wanted to keep it then he'd just wipe it and do a restore :confused:
 
Porco said:
Great story, and good on you for getting the phone back to its owner.

This also all goes to show the standard 4-digit passcode should not be relied upon to keep people out of your phone if you let it out of your control!
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No, but if it got lost or stolen, it will buy me time to get to a computer to block the SIM. At least, that's the main reason for me, and 4 digits is plenty for that.
 
Why are people still posting about what they THINK the malicious intents of the OP are when he clearly stated he returned the phone to an extremely happy original owner? :confused:
 
Interesting thread.

I hope the owner knows that he needs to change his passcode. :)
 
truthsmiles said:
A final note - I find the responses very interesting - especially considering the times they were posted and the locations they seem to be from. The initial responses were mostly negative - mostly saying at first that it couldn't be done, and then once I did do it, that I had either broken the law or done something evil. Later (during US daylight hours), the comments became much more "civil" and didn't seem to be accusing me of trying to do something wrong.

Do I think the police (especially in my area) are smart enough to figure out how to get the phone back to its owner? Not a chance. Do I take personal responsibility for seeing the phone returned safely to its owner? Completely. Did I try to think of other ways to get the phone back to him quickly? Yes I did - and none seemed to me likely to result in the phone being returned before he just went out and bought another one. Could I have caused this guy damage by having his data in my hands? Of course, but he's my neighbor and a fellow human being who has not harmed me at all.
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I find it very, very unlikely that an Apple Store or would have seen success in tracing the owner of a handset. Perhaps the carrier could, but from experience with other lost devices, i've found in many cases they simply wipe their hands clean of it (had some Apple devices stolen from a place I worked for in the past, Apple had stated they simply can't and won't do anything - it was up to local authorities to maybe, possibly recover the device). Maybe the device will have ended up on a shelf somewhere. Maybe with some stroke of luck he would have gone looking for it and ended up at the Apple Store. However there's a lot of factors dependent on good fortune there. At least with your solution, finding the owner was guaranteed, and the owner was thrilled to have their device returned to them, so I can't think of any better outcome.

Perhaps the only concerning bit is that in doing so you possibly opened yourself to some liabilities, had the owner reacted differently when notified of the events leading up to their discovery, it could have ended much worse. They didn't, so all is well, but keep it in mind should the situation arise again.

(Finally, I don't believe in karma. Too many people I know doing awful things and reaping the benefits without consequence while I play by the rules, be polite, assist whenever I can and ultimately have little to show for it.)

burnside said:
Next time you try to play Sherlock, why don't you just take the phone to the Apple store and let them decide what the next course of action is. No one asked you to play PI. We're just asking that you go by the letter of the law.
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See what I wrote above. The OP got results. Different take on this between us for sure, but one can't deny when presented to the Apple Store / Police Station as the primary channel, it's hit and miss at best as to whether the owner will actually receive their device back. With phones it's admittedly a little easier as they're all bound to a carrier or network and maybe in this case it would have ended well regardless. Assuming anything else though, such as a MacBook Pro or iPad, well that has a much slimmer chance of being traced.
 
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burnside said:
LOL. I'd have lawyers waiting at his doorstep if he hacked my phone, and believe me, I would win.
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In your case, if I ever find your phone, I will just throw it in the trash. Hope that works for you.

Personally, I would be happy that somebody took the time to figure out I was the owner and returned the phone to me.

Geez.
 
either way it's disturbing how this thread could be used for malicious intent.

the fact of the matter is many members are skilled and possess the knowledge to do what OP intended.

And some real everyday stories are too good to be true so best not to judge members rationale towards the event.

It doesn't make a difference as everybody other than the OP has nothing to do with the matter but still are concerned since they presumably all own expensive idevices. I personally appreciate the return to rightful owner. Perhaps the password bypass was a means to get that done. calling the last dialled number or ICE or Home or whatever is the right way to go.
 
truthsmiles said:
So I know this is likely to be brushed off by some as not true, but after several hours of screwing around I did in fact get the passcode. It was 1216.

After reading a bunch of forums I almost thought it wasn't possible, but it is (I don't think it is with the 4S, but it looks like most other phones can be cracked). Like I said earlier, I downloaded Gecko iPhone Toolkit (yes, I had to bust out the Windows machine since it's an .exe).

If you're curious, there is a decent article about it here: www.howtoarena.com/xry-is-not-the-only-software-which-can-crack-your-iphones-passcode/

It wasn't as straightforward as the article leads one to believe. I'm not a hacker or anything, so I was nearly stumped when the "Unexpected Parameter" message about i4ramdisk.dmg came up. However, another article (forum.gsmhosting.com/vbb/archive/t-1441284.html) helped me out with that issue.

If you follow the instructions exactly, it totally works. Side note: I did find that DFU mode was really hard to get into until I watched this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rMujSKuKmnY

Like I said, I'm not some big-time programmer or anything, but it looks like what it does is put the phone into some kind of mode where Gecko can attempt to change the password repeatedly without any of delay rules normally imposed by the OS. Once it hits the correct password it just shows it to you.

The only piece of "new" knowledge I have to contribute is this: There were no instructions anywhere I found on how to "escape" the DFU/Redsn0w/Gecko mode once it got the passcode, so I just held my breath and unplugged it, and held down the power and home buttons until I saw the apple. I released the apple and it booted up to the passcode screen. 1-2-1-6 and *click*. Woo-hoo!

Although I still don't know exactly who owns the phone (I looked at a couple emails, but I really don't want to snoop any more than I need to), but I can see who's been calling him, so when it gets to a reasonable hour, I'll start calling them and see if I can get a name and address and drop it in the mail.

Yes, I admit, it was an extraordinary effort to help out this random dude, but it's been very educational and a good lesson for me: I'm going to put an "If found" message on my lock screen in case I ever lose my phone and the person finding it is nice enough to return it.

Other lesson learned: Nothing is private!

PS. Yes I know my story is crazy. I can't imagine how a phone ended up in my ditch unless it was thrown there (or perhaps stolen by someone and tossed there). Also, I have no idea why the lady who found the phone would give it to me for some cans. She didn't seem "savvy" if you catch my drift, and maybe she didn't know what it was worth. I swear, I couldn't make this stuff up if I tried! Haha. Welp, I've spent far too much time on this endeavor and now I have to run... I would say "thanks", but none of you really helped me :p

----------

PPS - To those of you saying to take it to the police: call me crazy but part of me simply doesn't trust that the police or even ATT or Apple will REALLY try to find the owner. And, yes, I totally admit that I contemplated keeping it, but I just started thinking about whoever lost it, and I realized if I were in his shoes I would really want my phone back. They're expensive!
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Have you tried the Gecko with an iPhone 4S yet? I wasnt able to get it to work. Wonder if you or anyone out there have any luck. When I click on the dropdown box, I only see iPhone 4, not 4S. Wonder if there is a new update to Gecko???
 
If it's a 4S, you should still be able to activate Siri and get the phone to do a few tasks. Could include asking it, "who am I", which will list the owners contact card, or try saying something like, "call home" and see who answers.
 
burnside said:
There's a reason why people put passcodes on their phone. It doesn't matter if you're Jesus or Mother Teresa, THEY DON'T WANT ANYONE ACCESSING THEIR PHONE! What if this was a company phone which you hacked into? You could be sued up the river dude, very STUPID!

Next time you try to play Sherlock, why don't you just take the phone to the Apple store and let them decide what the next course of action is. No one asked you to play PI. We're just asking that you go by the letter of the law.

I can just imagine parking my car in front of this guys house. "Oh, I finally got into the car but I don't see any address in the glove box. I'm just going to try and hot wire this vehicle and drive around until I find the owner."
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I can't believe you just compared an iPhone to a car.

If you lose an iPhone it could be near impossible to find. A car... Not so much.

You really think taking the phone to the Apple store would really solve the problem? I know a manager at a large Apple store (I will not mention the location for their own privacy) but they tell me tons of stories of how people bring in lost devices and they just sit in the back room and after a month or two they just keep them.

And taking the iPhone to the police? ... I'm pretty sure they have better things to do than find out who's phone that is. Like perhaps find the old lady who's walking around with $30 worth of cans.

I laugh at people like you. Regardless if the OP is telling the truth or not, it's a great read and everyone is entitled to their own judgement.

If you don't want ANYONE hacking into your phone, simply don't lose it. I find it hilarious how you're making a big deal about this (and throwing in the law) when you're own government is screwing you up the ass and you continue to pay taxes and think the money you pay "is going to a good cause" while your government continues to take nice trips and receives their yearly bonuses on your dime.
 
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