3 settings to enable before your phone gets stolen!

Imagine yourself walking through a crowded market (which, let’s be honest, is every Indian market ever). You’re searching for an address on Google Maps, phone in hand, lost and distracted while scanning for the right signboard. And then, bam! Your phone vanishes, because a central character straight out of a typical chor-police story decided to mark their entry.

There you are, shocked, confused, pulling expressions that don’t even have names yet, standing clueless about what to do next. And while you’re stuck in that daze, the thief is already onto step one: switching your phone off so you can’t track it.

But guess what? What if you could outsmart them even before they try? Let’s walk through three simple but genius settings that can save the data in your phone, your sanity, and if you’re truly lucky, maybe even help you get your phone back.

1. Lock the power button with a password

Let’s secure the first step first. Stopping the thief from powering your phone off. That’s the thief’s go-to move.

But here’s the hack: go to “Settings” ->search for “Power Off”-> Tap on “Require Password to Power Off” and then enable it.

Now, whenever someone tries to shut your phone down, they’ll need your password. And spoiler alert: they don’t have it, unless, of course, you’ve got the password already written on the back cover so you wouldn’t forget it.

2. Stop them from sneaking into quick settings

If shutting down doesn’t work, the next thing any pro thief will do is enable Flight Mode. Why? Because once your phone’s offline, tracking it becomes nearly impossible.

Here’s how to block that: just head to “Settings”-> “Notifications & Quick Settings”-> “Quick Settings”.

Then, disable “Allow Quick Settings on Lock Screen”.

Basically, you’re cutting off their shortcut to Flight Mode. So, unless the thief knows your passcode, your phone stays online, loud and trackable.

3. Keep tracking even without a SIM

But what if the thief goes old school and yanks out your SIM card. Game over? Nope, cause you can make your phone trackable even when it’s offline.

Go to “Settings”-> search for “Find Hub” (or “Find My Device” on some phones)-> tap “Find Your Offline Devices” and enable “Network in All Areas”.

This setting ensures your phone can still be located, even if it’s offline, without a SIM, or chilling in some random corner of the city.

The bottom line

Nearly 7,000 phones are snatched in Delhi every year, and only about 1,700 ever make their way back to their owners, that’s less than a 25% recovery rate.

Phones aren’t just gadgets; they’re our lifelines, wallets, memories, gossip vaults, more importantly, they get the various OTPs that we need to even have a digital life.

Losing one feels like losing a part of yourself. But with these three basic settings enabled, you’re at least stacking the odds in your favour.

So before you head out today, take five minutes to tweak these settings. You’ll be preventing a major loss, even if the chances feel as small as 0.0001%. Because while Mr Thief thinks he’s the smart one, you’ve just proved you’re two steps ahead.