Security for Android Phones with no SIM CARD

[clau_and_90]

reasoning: A thief might start the phone with no sim card and if that phone has not been yet locked
he can factory reset the phone and get rid of Anti Theft protection.
I would like to suggest an option for setting up an e-mail address to which Anti Theft can send Location Information if the phone has any access to the internet, in stealth mode without  any avast icon or lock screen. so the thief will not know the phone has avast installed

and also if possible a password option for the System Recovery mode of the Phone or a remap of the keys needed for booting into Recovery mode.

Another idea would be to password protect the "FACTORY RESET" option from the "SETTINGS" menu

And another idea cause I just seem to find ever more creating ways of stealing my own phone   
How about making avast Anti Theft persistent between "FACTORY RESETS" ?

It would be nice if all the above features could be implemented without root access.


Thank you.

 

[reinhardholzner]

How about making avast Anti Theft persistent between "FACTORY RESETS" ?
--> it is already if you install rooted, its not possible non-rooted unfortunately because Android does not support this

We are implementing internet remote control at the moment which will also work for non-sim-card devices and works similar to as you suggest!

[Lisandro]

How about making avast Anti Theft persistent between "FACTORY RESETS" ?

Holzner, it cannot survive a restore of Google stock image right?
I mean, installing this... http://code.google.com/intl/pt-BR/android/nexus/images.html

[Filip Havlicek]

It can't 100% survive ROM flashing, nothing can.

Filip

[Lisandro]

It can't 100% survive ROM flashing, nothing can.

Thanks Filip.
But, if you block the USB Debugging Mode, can a ROM flashing be avoided or not?
Should you block your bootloader also?

[Filip Havlicek]

That's probably a question for someone else, I don't do rooting/flashing on a daily basis so I'm pretty sure I don't know all the tricks

Filip

[reinhardholzner]

hi yes USB debugging can be blocked making it much harder to flash a new image.
however it is technically not possible to also lock the bootloader

It can't 100% survive ROM flashing, nothing can.

Thanks Filip.
But, if you block the USB Debugging Mode, can a ROM flashing be avoided or not?
Should you block your bootloader also?

[Lisandro]

But, if you block the USB Debugging Mode, can a ROM flashing be avoided or not?

A suggestion/hint to increase avast! Mobile Security then: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.ramdroid.adbtoggle
What do you think?

however it is technically not possible to also lock the bootloader

Hmmm... Your data will be safe (seems so) but you'll lose the device to the thieve, won't you? The thieve will be able to flash a new ROM.

[reinhardholzner]

hi it IS already possible to lock USB debugging with Anti-Theft. See protection behaviors.

[Lisandro]

hi it IS already possible to lock USB debugging with Anti-Theft. See protection behaviors.

Well, but if you enabled USB debugging manually, work, forgot to disable it again... the thieve will caught the computer in an enabled status. You need to first, manually (SMS) block USB debugging. Am I right?
That tool automatically turns on/off the USB debugging scenario and brings quite a peace of mind and security.
Automatic behavior is described here: http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1560779

[reinhardholzner]

yeah but how should we find out if the phone is stolen or not if not by a) sim card change or b) sms command?

[Lisandro]

yeah but how should we find out if the phone is stolen or not if not by a) sim card change or b) sms command?

Come again please? Rephrase... Not following you.
What's the relationship with "know the phone is stolen" and "Usb debugging mode"?

[Enrique2SIM]

Hi,

This is an interesting topic. I'm a newbie so I'd like to ask if there any -Start Here- thread available in the forum so I can make my way appropriately.

Hope you all can help me.

Regards