Everyone would love to use an iPhone, but an iPhone is relatively expensive and unlike other smartphones, their prices don’t come down with time. The iPhone 6 and 6 Plus were launched recently yet the iPhone 5 and 5S still sell for over a Hundred thousand Naira. If you want to be trendy you wouldn’t go for the slightly outdated iPhone 4S with a smaller screen. So what do you do when you desperately want an iPhone but can’t afford a new one? Easy…you buy a used iPhone.
A few months ago, a friend of mine bought an iPhone 4S and one day out of the blue received a call from a Chinese man telling him (my friend) that the iPhone he was using was stolen from him (the Chinese guy). Now that’s rather embarrassing and unnerving.
There are some risks involved in buying a used iPhone as most times iPhones are locked to official retailers or networks and cannot be used until the password is retrieved (or hacked) and the phone is unlocked.
Apple has released a new Activation Lock Status checker on iCloud.com for those who buy used iPhones. All you need to do is get the phone’s serial or IMEI number from the about tab in the iPhones’ general settings and enter the numbers in the form on the website.
Based on the information you enter, if Activation Lock is active on the device, you will be prompted to contact the previous owner – if you know who the original owner is- and you will be given instructions on how to clear the data on the phone for reuse. The lock feature was first introduced with iOS 7. Using the Find My iPhone feature automatically turns on Activation Lock. Find My iPhone allows you to pinpoint the location of an iOS device remotely.
