What To Do If Your Cell Phone Is Lost

We’ve all been there. That sudden heart-stopping realization that we don’t know where our cell phone is. But in today’s world, it’s not just the loss of a communications device, which in itself is a mere annoyance and inconvenience. With the internet accessible from so many cell phones nowadays, we all carry email, text messages, and web browsing in our pockets. A missing or stolen cell phone can be a huge security risk, and the loss of data can expose you to significant financial risk. So if you’ve lost your cell phone, rest assured that you are not alone. Here is a list of things that you should do:

1. Calm down, sit down, and take a few long, deep breaths. Now, take a few minutes to quietly reflect on where you last remember having your cell phone. Retrace your steps, back to that place, all the while looking around you for your phone. Often you’ll find your cell phone by taking the time to relax and reflect.
2. Call your cell phone so that you can hear it ring. If you don’t have another phone handy, ask a friend to make the call for you. It’s critical to do this as soon as you can after you realize that your cell phone is missing, before the battery runs out.
3. If your ringer is turned off, or you can’t find your cell phone after calling it, contact every place you’ve been between the time you last had your cell phone and the time that you realized that your cell phone was lost. It doesn’t matter whether or not you actually used your cell phone there; it may have fallen out of your pocket, or you may have placed it on the table or counter during a meeting or a meal.
4. If you don’t find your lost cell phone within a few hours, call your carrier and have them turn off all services! This is the most critical step. If your cell phone falls into the hands of the wrong person, the information you have stored on it can be used to steal your identity.

After having them turn off all services, buy a new cell phone from your carrier’s local store, and have all the data you have access to restored to your new phone. This may be very quick – in some situations you may be back up and running within a few minutes. But even if it takes a while, the inconvenience of having to set up a new phone is absolutely nothing like the inconvenience you’ll face if someone pretends to be you, drains your bank accounts, harasses your friends, posts your pictures on the Internet, and more. By the way, there are now programs for some smart phones which will turn your ringer on remotely for you, so that you can try to find your cell phone by calling it even if it was set to mute when you lost it. They do this by having you text a PIN to your cell phone, which tells the phone to set the ringer to high. One such program for the Google G1 phone is PinTail.

Is your phone lost? Download our Lost Cell Phone Checklist and find your phone now!