Question for SLF Tech Gurus

[rosarugosa]

I recently got a new phone, and I would like to drop the old one in the Lion's Club donation box. Is removing the SIM card a sufficient safety measure, or should I be doing something else?

[happystuff]

How about also reset to initial factory settings?

[Alan]

If it's a smart phone you should reset to factory default, which can be accomplished in your settings. If it's not a smart phone, removing the SIM should be fine.

[rosarugosa]

It is a smart phone, thanks.

[SteveinMN]

happystuff and Alan have it exactly right. If it's an iPhone, before you reset it, log out from Find My iPhone and from iCloud. (There may be a similar procedure for Android phones but I don't know it.)

Don't forget to make sure your carrier knows the old phone is gone -- your phone manufacturer, too, if you tied into their services.

[jp1]

Steve, what if you didn’t log out of find my iPhone before doing the reset. SO reset his old iPhone without doing so and now when trying to set it up as a new phone it wants to restore it to be his phone again with all his apps/data and such. Is the only option now to do so and then turn off find my iPhone and reset it a second time?

[SteveinMN]

jp1, DH should be able to go to icloud.com on the Web, sign in with his Apple ID, go to iCloud Settings, click Manage, and then go to the section of the page where he can remove the iPhone from his list of devices. Then he can reset and trade it in/sell it/give it away. Devices that are locked to an iCloud account that is not yours are generally treated as stolen devices and cannot be activated easily with Apple. So for that reason and the "everything old is new again" reason DH is encountering, it's good to log out first if possible, but removing the device through iCloud is an alternative.

[rosarugosa]

Thank you, SLF Tech Support! :)