Dont Change Your Google Password Before Factory Resetting Your Android Phone. This isnt a news story, but more of a public service announcement about an Android feature not everyone may be aware of. XpFNIz-8wVs/hqdefault.jpg' alt='Motorola Q Hard Reset Verizon Droid' title='Motorola Q Hard Reset Verizon Droid' />Menstrual cups are often a cheaper alternative than tampons, liners, and pads, but they dont always fit perfectly out of the box. Before you toss yours and shell. Hi I have a Motorola droid turbo xt 1254, bootloader unlocked using Sunshines tool, TWRP, a fantastic recovery, and currently am running Nexus Experience 10. Find out how to use and troubleshoot your smartphone with interactive simulators, howto guides and support videos. Droid Razr Reference You will need a rooted Droid Razr to install all ROMkernels. NOTE PLEASE ONLY INSTALL ROMS INTENDED FOR YOUR VERSION OF Droid Razr InformationWeek. News, analysis and research for business technology professionals, plus peertopeer knowledge sharing. Engage with our community. Verizon has decided to abruptly cut off wireless internet to some 8,500 rural customers in 13 states, saying their heavy data use had made it impossible to profit off. Please note that the procedure of unlocking the bootloader, rooting and installing a custom recovery on your Verizon Galaxy S3 SCHI535 is considered risky. Questions and Answers from the Community. Maybe the size of mouse you are giving him is too big. Make sure the mouse is hot enough. If youve ended up here because your Android phone is telling you that, after a factory reset, you cannot log into your device for 7. Free Software Open Rpt File Extension Programs. I dont have much good news youre going to have to wait it out. If you want to know why exactly this happens, regardless of whether or not it has affected you, this post will at least show you how to avoid falling victim to this security measure again if you find it to be too much trouble, as well as why this feature exists to begin with. Why am I locked out of my phone for 7. Back in March 2. 01. Google introduced a feature called Device Protection in its newly released version of Android, 5. Lollipop. Part of this new suite of security tools was something called Factory Reset Protection. This is the source of the 7. It is tripped by resetting your Google account password and then performing a factory reset on an Android device with Device Protection, meaning it runs 5. This feature is designed to allow you time to regain control of your Google account in the event it is compromised because your phone was stolen. Think of it this way if somebody changes the lock on a security door your phone the night before the building gets robbed, do you think the person changing the lock or someone else at the lock company might have been in on it Thats essentially the logic of factory reset protection. The idea is that your Google account and password are the lock and key that are required to open your Factory Reset Protection enabled device the door after it undergoes a factory reset, and that by changing your Google account password, youre tampering with the lock right before you enter the door which is suspicious. And so at that point, Google initiates a 7. After that 7. 2 hours expires, you still need to log in with the previously connected Google accounts password. The difference is that during the hold, you just cant log in at all after the hold is over, you obviously still need to verify the account password. Why is this a feature Isnt this insane overkillThe reason the hold is triggered is that, once your Google account is compromised on a stolen phone easy enough to do the thief has your Gmail and probably your phone number, there is essentially no other way to stop a thief from successfully erasing all traces of your account ever having been on said phone, since a wipe can be done directly from the recovery menu on bootup without any sort of authorization PINpattern protected startup does not prevent this. That 7. 2 hours theoretically gives you time to get your Google account back under your control and change the password again, making the thiefs attempts to log in futile. If youre wondering why a thief would know your Google account password and not your PINpattern lock, thats actually more likely to happen than you might think its completely possible to reset your Google account password without knowing the current one if youve got somebodys smartphone. Two factor authentication generally relies on SMS, so the thief would get the authenticator on your stolen phone, and you probably would also have your backup email account synced to that smartphone as well which, hey, good personal security idea dont put your backup account on your phone. Generally speaking, it is comparatively much, much harder to change the lock screen on a phone if you dont know the existing PIN, pattern, or password, and short of social engineering or plain luck, thats hard information to get. Is there any way around factory reset protection once its triggered Sadly, no. Once the protection system is tripped, youve got a functionally useless smartphone until that 3 day lockout expires. If youve been locked out of your device and are looking for a workaround, sorry there isnt one that were aware of. Youre going to have to wait you also cannot sign in to the phone using another account this would kind of defeat the purpose of the feature. Those affected by this problem have confirmed Google support is of no help in the matter theyll just tell you to wait out the timer, during which time your phone has all the utility of a paperweight. This suggests Google really has no control over the timer itself once its been triggered, though we cant be sure. Can I disable this feature Factory Reset Protection Device Protection Nice try, phone thieves But really, in the interest of full disclosure, yes you can disable all Device Protection features and it is an all or nothing switch, including Factory Reset Protection, and doing so is relatively quick and painless on supported devices. Here is the process. Enable developer options on your phone Google it its easy, usually you just go into the settings, about phone, find the build number might be under software, and then tap it until it says You are now a DeveloperGo to developer options and find Enable OEM unlock. Check the box, and hit enable. You will get a warning saying this will disable device protection features, and this includes factory reset protection. And Ive tested it factory reset protection no longer works with this checkbox enabled. If your device does not have an allow OEM unlocking option, that means one of two things. First, it most likely means it doesnt support factory reset protection to begin with, and that your phone is not protected in the event someone wipes it or it may have a 3rd party solution. Second, it could just mean the company that made your phone or the carrier decided not to include the OEM unlock toggle and is kind of a dick, and in that case, you only have one option, and its a bad one bottom of this section. As to what allowing OEM unlocking really does, it basically tells the system that the bootloader is authorized to be unlocked note not the same as actually unlocking it and that Android wont stop you in the event you should attempt to do it. And yes, this makes your phone less secure, because it potentially means a thief could flash custom software to your phone, etc., and Google is politely saying its not their problem if something bad happens when you do this. If you dont want to use the Enable OEM Unlock method or do not have such a toggle, the only other practical option to disable ADP is to run with an unsecured lock screen. Not very appealing, right Android Device Protection requires that you have a PIN, pattern, or password for your lockscreen in order to function. Without those things, its features become useless anyway accounts can be removed from the device without any additional authorization, and thus theres really no protection to begin with. How do I know if my phone has Factory Reset Protection The easiest way is to just do a factory reset while logged in to the device with a Google account and a screen PINpattern set and see if you get the following dialog on startup. If you do, youve got factory reset protection. If you dont, you either dont have it or its disabled. Device Protection should be on almost any Android device that shipped with Android 5. It will also work on some phones that shipped with some version of 5. Galaxy S6, and were later updated to Android 5.