Locked iPhone 3G

Hey folks, I have a student that has locked herself out of her iPhone. It is a 3G, running 4.1 I believe. I was hoping one of you might know a good trick to bypass the code without having to restore the device. She has some notes inside, and doesn't want to lose them. All we could find online is the emergency call > random number > call > lock button, which will give you access to the dial pad, contacts, and photos, but not to anything else in the phone. Any help would be appreciated.

On a side note, should we have a separate section for mobile devices? I know it mentions cell phones under the description for 'wireless', but with the growing number of smart devices, iPads, iPhones, Android tablets/phones, etc. it might be worthwhile to have a section dedicated to them. Just sayin'...

Apparently you can slide the unlock then when the code comes up try emergency calls then double tap home button then tap power icon then fast respiring... not too sure if this will work but you can try.

Hmmm.......

I guess that information is not something I would post, even if I knew it......If anyone does have an answer please use PM or some external mechanism.

We [AO] do not promote criminal activity, and the info would be useful to criminals?

Tell her to look at Motorola for her replacement.................YES! I actually said that ;)..............MOTOROLA!!!!! :eek:

She might try Apple?.................if you can afford to waste your money on their kit, surely you can afford their support???

I find it odd that you can lock yourself out of such a device............given that it is yours, and you presumably use it every day??? How did this happen?

She has "some notes"..................Give her a reporter's notepad and a pencil? ;)

I guess it could possibly be useful to criminals, but you can unlock them anyway... but you will lose the data. I would guess that most people that steal iPhones are looking to resell them, and don't necessarily want your data [obviously not in all cases]. You can restore them on any computer that has iTunes.

She called AT&T but they said they couldn't help her with the issue. I doubt Apple would hand out a way to bypass their lock.

She said that she thought she had synced it lately, but we weren't sure if that also synced the notes. I told her to just restore it, and hope the notes were backed up.

She told me that she had the same passcode for quite a while, and then late at night decided that it was time to change it. When she tried what she thought she had changed it to the next morning, it wouldn't unlock.

For most students I wouldn't really care, and would just tell them too bad, but she was a practicum student [more or less a student helper for the technology department], so I thought I would give it a shot.

The method that bagz suggested does work, but only gets you to the phone, contacts, and photos.

Is the phone Jailbroken?

Have you tried SSH into the handset? the default password should be Alpine :)

I'll send something that may/maynot be useful via PM shortly. :)

Hi westin,

No offence meant mate! I have no problem with supplying the information (if I had it), I just wouldn't post it on the front page of a public forum. ;)

I am afraid I don't have an iPhone, although they are rather impressive. Over here they are very expensive and you are usually tied into a costly contract. The providers have now turned ratty with bandwidth allocation as well. :mad:

I would personally go with a tablet PC and a more regular cellphone on pay as you go. Much better value given the UK pricing scenario (anyways I have fat fingers and poor eyesight :D)

I will be seeing a friend on Monday or Tuesday who is a real cellphone geek. He currently has an iPhone 3, and may well have the answer. He is the guy who put me onto the Motorola management buyout and the new range of 4G "phones". Apparently they are doing a tablet PC as well. I will ask him and let you know.

I know you can reset the things (and lose your data) or even "hotwire" them to regain basic functionality. What I don't know is where it stores what it ought to consider to be temporary or volatile data? If it is on a removable memory card then you are in with a chance; provided that it only locks access, and does not encrypt the data. You could then use a card reader and PC software applications.

Otherwise I am sure that Apple have a way of getting into it, provided you can prove ownership and pay them the exorbitant fee. I would guess that it is something like D**l laptops and works on the device's serial number, so there is an unlock code that is unique to each device. A sort of "master password" if you like.

I would have thought that syncing would transfer all volatile data as well as static, although I could be wrong...................check the sync device?

Please let us know the answer as it could be important to other people with iPhones, who may think that they are backing stuff up and aren't ;)

Personally, I wouldn't trust important data to that sort of device without backing it up ASAP. They are all too easily stolen, damaged, dropped or just plain malfunction?

Hey nihil, no offense taken. I can definitely see your point of view. :)

I will email the student today, and see if she had any luck.

edit:

@HYBR|D - Thanks for the PM... I realized after I hit 'submit' on my reply, that I had misspelled your name... my apologies. :)

I just talked to the student... She reset her phone after talking to AT&T once, and Apple twice. She said the first Apple tech was pretty nice, and tried to walk her through a few things, but the second tech was bent on trying to sell her the $30/month support contract. So, she reset it to factory, and then restored from backup, and had just about everything. A few of her notes were gone, but she still had most of them.

Thanks for the replies, PMs, etc. Much appreciated!