Assuming the thief want both the phone and the data (because data / your identity is very valuable these days).

  • Otherbarry@lemmy.frozeninferno.xyz
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    5 days ago

    May be overthinking it a bit, the typical opportunistic thief that would try to snatch a phone and run is just looking to see what bank apps you have installed. Usually they are looking to see if you have something like Venmo installed so they can go into your app and send themselves your money. Venmo of course will say that money was transferred from your phone so it was clearly you and there’s nothing to dispute, hence you’re fucked.

    These type of thieves already know to try to keep the screen unlocked long enough to do that, afterwards they usually just toss the phone somewhere. The phone hardware itself isn’t that useful while it’s still locked down and tied to someone’s Google/Apple account, most phones are firmware locked in that fashion. Sure they could wait it out until you finally remove the phone from your Google/Apple account but every time they check it’ll keep giving out their location, not really worth it.

    Nowadays current Android phones do have theft protection to prevent loss in a snatch attempt e.g. my Android has settings to auto lock it if it detects fast movement while unlocked, and it also auto locks if the entire phone itself has been set offline/airplane mode for a while.