Every time I mention "what are they going to do with a locked phone?" people always say, "they can reprogram it" or "they'll sell it for parts" Apple has not even addressed that perception.
But no one really seems to know for sure.
As long as the perception exists that a stolen phone is a good phone, then people will continue to steal them.
Now I know that you can't trust Find My iPhone to save you when your phone gets stolen. So I wouldn't recommend it. There's other apps that carriers use that may be better, or even a jailbroken apps would do more good.
Once you put it into Lost / Stolen mode and wipe the iPhone, it is 100% useless, the reason people still steal is because the time to educate the world, is far greater than for the world to learn about "iPhone".
No matter if they jailbreak it, no matter if they DFU mode it, no matter if they recover mode it. There is absolutely no way for a thief to use your iPhone.
Only thing good they can get:
- Parts = Screen (if good), Battery, SIM tray, Power button, Camera?
Logic/motherboard = 100% Useless.
They can't even go into a Apple Store and get a replacement like they used to before iCloud was introduced. Now Apple requires that the device be removed from the iCloud account by going to icloud.com, signing in with the icloud account that the device is associated with and removing it, otherwise they will not issue a replacement no matter how sorry your story is. So never remove this iPhone from your iCloud account, otherwise person can use it outside of USA if they can get it IMEI unlocked.
Lastly, Find my iPhone is only useable to a certain extent because there are these issues (perhaps its not Apple to blame as there are laws, carrier's and many other walls that they need to get through before these can be overcome -- from our point of view it may seem simple, but implementing it is another worlds work):
1) Battery life and device must remain powered ON
2) There is data connection available (Cellular/WiFi):
-- With Data there are two things that go wrong though:
-----1) Thief removes the SIM
-----2) Owner disables the SIM by calling carrier
3) Are you really going to be able to locate a phone (not just iPhone) in a apartment building? chances are like 0.01%
Only way around to getting a feature like Find my iPhone to be useful in case a device is stolen would require the following:
1) Some sort of backup battery that keeps the GPS antenna alive
2) Some sort of backup data service that can transmit the devices location back to owner (Something like 911 service but in the form of Data, which allows a device to access such service even without a SIM) -- Its up to the carrier's to implement something like this, Apple SIM in a way is one step closer, if it could be built into the device rather than being ejectable. However I think companies rely much on insurance to pick up the bill instead.
3) law enforcement committed to providing assistance (this is probably one of the even bigger hurdles to overcome than the first 2)
I'm sorry your lost your iPhone, I can understand for some it can be devastating loss because of the value a device like an iPhone holds for one.
I think in the next 5-10 years we would see some things like what I mentioned above to help better locate lost/stolen devices because the electronic waste is about to go sky rocketing with all these disabled iPhones.
I would highly recommend those that are responsible enough to enable two step verification, its a whole new world of security, the security questions / answers no longer relevant.
What you need each time is 2 of the following: 1) Authorized Device and Password even to log into iCloud.com to check email or photos or other documents such as pages, numbers etc.
To reset password: 1) Authorized Device in hand and you need to be able to access this device via passcode or touch ID 2) Recovery Key --- Without the minimum 2 pieces you or anyone else cannot get into your Account and Apple cannot help you because you won't be able to call in to get your password reset
