The security company Avast has performed an research in New York City and San Francisco which allowed them to state that lost smartphones are often reseted to factory default by individuals which ‘find’ the lost smart phone.
The security company had left 20 Android-smartphones in New York City and San Francisco, on those devices the ‘Avast Anti-Theft’, ‘Lockout Mobile Security’ and ‘Clean Master’ application were installed to allow them to keep track of the Android smartphones.
Over the months, the analysts used the Avast Anti-Theft app to track the lost devices and observed the following:
- 15 phones were wiped clean using the factory reset feature
- 11 phones stayed online for more than 24 hours after losing them
- 7 phones we were able to track for several months
- 4 phones were returned
- 4phones are currently online and used
- 2 phones ended up abroad
- 1 phone was never factory data reset