Boss remote wiped my phone can I get the data back?

LDjshan on 16/02/2016 - 20:49

Hi Everyone

This is my first post so please be kind.
My Boss accidentally did a remote wipe on my phone through outlook. I have a Samsung 6 edge

The last back up that i have seen on it was for January 29th, I have lost everything but worst of all i have lost my kids first day of school photos.( 1 Feb)

So i have taken into a phone repair store and they have had it since last Thursday. The owner of the repair store has told me it's a huge process and that he needs to get into mass storage and that he is trying to contact Samsung. He said he has been working on it loads.

Can anyone help me? is he lying to me?

I am totally gutted about the whole thing

Mobile

Comments

  • knightriderme on 16/02/2016 - 21:33

    Its a 50 / 50 chance, but I think you should be able to recover the files, I hope the repair store hasn't played with the phone to much because it might effect the recovery process.

    Are you in Melbourne? let me know if you are I might be able to help. All the Best

    • Djshan on 16/02/2016 - 21:56
      +1

      No in WA
      Apparently he has done a lot of scans not sure what else he has done but he still has it.

      Thank you

  • mrstan on 16/02/2016 - 21:48

    Its a long shot, but you could try recover by data recover software. Do a whirlpool search for some recommendations.

    • Djshan on 16/02/2016 - 21:58

      I haven't tried anything, gave it straight to the repair man as i thought would be my best option. Thanks will have a look

  • the-mal on 16/02/2016 - 22:06
    +4

    The owner of the repair store has told me it's a huge process and that he needs to get into mass storage and that he is trying to contact Samsung. He said he has been working on it loads.

    is he lying to me?

    There's not really "loads" to do. In fact he really should be doing as little as possible to the phone (certainly not turning it on and using it).

    All the "undelete" or "recover" programs really do is try to look for data that is still sitting on the flash memory that has been deallocated but not yet overwritten with new data. As the phone is used this memory will slowly get recycled and written over, so if the phone hasn't been used much since you had your data erased there's a good chance a lot of stuff can be recovered from the internal and SD memory.

    There are plenty of free or cheap tools with easy instructions that show you how to do this yourself. There's not much more that the repair guy could be doing.

    • Djshan on 16/02/2016 - 22:16

      Thank you
      Unfortunately there is no SD card for this phone.
      All of this is like a foreign language to me which makes it very difficult and i feel like i am getting ripped off. I don't know what to do.

      • the-mal on 16/02/2016 - 22:26
        +1

        How much are they charging you? Are they a data recovery place or just one of those shopping centre "phone repair" places?

        In short there's not really many things they could try. There are a few recovery tools they could try to run (just simple point and click programs) or if they needed to they could try to get root access to the phone to run a wider array of tools. Both are pretty simple things to do that wouldn't require them contacting Samsung at all.

        Hopefully what they're not doing is turning on the phone and playing around with it. The more time the phone is switched on the less chance you have of recovering any data.

        Are you 100% sure the phone didn't have any backup services turned on by default that may have automatically saved your photos to say Google Photos or a Samsung Account?

        • Djshan on 17/02/2016 - 00:20

          $99 so far

          He is a mobile and computer repair store not in shopping center I had read reviews and had used him previously for screen repair. ( Starting to think he may be just like them but in his own shop.

          First thing i did was looked on google and Samsung i found nothing.

          Sad lesson learnt

        • the-mal on 17/02/2016 - 07:07
          +3

          @Djshan:

          I wouldn't waste any more money with the repairer. Screen/hardware repair and data recovery are totally different. He is probably just googling things to try and may be making it worse.

          If you can get your phone back, leave ur switched off and come back on here and try some of the tools people have suggested such as Recuva and see how you go.

          If the mobile repairer hasn't fixed it within a day or two chances are you're just wasting your money.

        • Djshan on 17/02/2016 - 10:14

          Thank you

          I'm taking my husband to get it today

          Thanks for your help will keep you updated

  • Master Bates on 16/02/2016 - 22:35

    Worth a try.

    Probably best left to someone mildly technical.

    • Djshan on 17/02/2016 - 00:22

      Thank you will have a look.

  • frondono on 16/02/2016 - 22:40

    This is the one I used it worked pretty well

    http://www.cgsecurity.org/wiki/PhotoRec

    • Djshan on 17/02/2016 - 00:22

      Thank you i will have a look

  • Randxyz123 on 16/02/2016 - 23:01

    Alright by "phone repair store" I seriously hope you mean a authorised samsung repairer and not some random bloke in the middle of a shopping centre or a random phone repairer.

    Those shopping centre places are the best ones to completely f up your phone with something like this and I'd be taking it to a data recovery specialist. The more the repair place use the phone the harder data recovery is. They should be able to recover the data depending on the type of wipe of memory that was done.

    If data recovery is possible it will most likely be $500 -$1000. You may consider the cost worth it given it has your kid's first day of school photos on it. Alternatively you can try doing it yourself. The problem with doing it yourself is the freeware data recovery software is no where near as good as a data repair centre. The other thing is that that kind of software works if you have deleted a photo off your phone or SD card and not formatted your phone to factory settings.

    I must say I'm curious how your boss did a remote wipe of your phone through outlook. I know you can do that through the web app but surely your boss would have to be logged on as you or as the admin account. I've never worked with outlook so I'm not sure.

    As someone who does work in IT in my mind if it is a company phone, the IT manager should be the only one who can wipe the phone so people who don't know what they are doing don't accidentally go around clicking it.

    Google photos might be turned on or your samsung account. So be sure to check those 2 places.

    • airzone on 17/02/2016 - 00:19
      +3

      It's pretty easy with the ecp on an admin account. But not by accident.. You really have to be wanting to wipe a phone.

      As an IT manager, only myself and my delegate have authority to wipe phones, the "boss" cannot (although he can certainly task us with the job). But not all companies with exchange have an it dept.

      From a policy perspective, any company issued phones come with the proviso that they will be wiped at any time so don't keep personal stuff on it. For byod, this capability is spelled out as a condition of using them on exchange. I would hate to wipe someone's phone, so I try and persuade them not to go through with it.

    • Djshan on 17/02/2016 - 00:36

      Thank you for the reply
      Repairer not in shopping center( thinking may be similar), but I had read reviews and used them previously for screen repair (now thinking may not be true reviews).

      I am thinking i have totally screwed myself by using them now.

      Ok so the phone is my phone but i use it for work. I received emails from my work email address to my phone, my boss was trying to fix outlook on my work computer and next thing i know my phone starts doing weird things and shuts off and comes back on factory reset. I didn't fully see what happened.
      Unfortunately google photos nor Samsung account showed anything.

      Will not be using phone for work anymore and will back up now

      • Randxyz123 on 17/02/2016 - 13:45
        +1

        my boss was trying to fix outlook on my work computer and next thing i know my phone starts doing weird things and shuts off and comes back on factory reset.

        Seriously that makes no sense… How the hell your boss managed to press "remote wipe" out of all the options is beyond me. Why they didn't know what it did is also strange I mean it's pretty obvious what it means.

        Take it straight to a data recovery place. They will tell you if they can recover the data and if so they will charge you. If you decide not to go ahead with it you don't have to. If you aren't overly confident with doing it yourself this is the option I'd recommend.

  • t_c on 16/02/2016 - 23:41

    Doesn't dropbox come with the s6?

    • Djshan on 17/02/2016 - 00:37

      Unfortunately has been full for a while

  • Troposa on 17/02/2016 - 18:51

    I vote for Zero chance of recovery from phone internal memory. No point in having remote wipe if you can unwipe.
    If its encrypted all you need to do is delete the key and you wont see your data for a thousand years.

    Love to know the outcome.

  • 2Poor4Ozb on 17/02/2016 - 20:21

    you can use samsung software
    http://www.asoftech.com/articles/samsung-galaxy-photo-recove…
    most photo can be recover as long as you dont use your phone after deletion as it will take up the space.

  • hellspice on 17/02/2016 - 21:41

    I'm an exchange be admin and your data is gone. You had active sync enabled to push your outlook to your phone. The reason you can't get it back is to stop corporate data being lost. If was easy to get back there would be no point in the feature. On the other hand you have learnt the importance of backing up your own stuff. Not agreeing to giving control of your device to someone else and your boss shouldn't be playing with exchange.
    I hope and would like to hear if you can get it back. Good luck.

  • phocus on 19/02/2016 - 13:35

    never used the samsung wipe feature before, but one would assume you would need to input a code/pin in order to wipe along with multiple "are you sure" buttons?

  • lukey159 on 24/02/2016 - 14:18

    Don't suppose you used Googles own photo's Unlimited Storage Option? - They give you the choice when you first open the photos app on your phone. https://www.google.com/photos/about/

    If dropbox was full what about google drive / one drive (if installed) ?

    As others have said its 50 / 50 with data recovery and the sooner you act upon it the better, wish you luck though!

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