Mobile Defense for Android

"In Chicago, more than 85,000 phones were found in taxis--about four for every taxi in the Windy City"
-PC World

Almost everyone has lost a phone at some point in time, whether it only temporarily lost, or never to be found again. A recent video was circulated around the tech blogs from CBSNews showing CNET reporter Natali Del Conte tossing her phone in the back of a cab, in hopes that Microsoft's MyPhone service will help her find it. In the end, her phone is returned to her by an honest citizen. The service was touted as something new for phones, but hardcore users know this type of application has been around for a bit, this is just the first time it was available directly from the phones OS.

Android users have had several applications become available since the launch of the G1 over a year ago that allow the phone to be tracked by gps. One of the earliest was GPS Tracker. I used the application from the day it was released, but in the last few months decided to make my phone secure with Mobile Defense(the quote above is form their front page). The application is free on the Android Market right now and currently in Beta form, but it's a pretty good Beta version. We'll take a look at the application itself to see how it works and what the features are. Hit the read more link to continue.

You can find Mobile Defense in the market, I did a search for the title and pulled it up pretty easily. As you can see, it's about average size for an android application so you don't have to worry about it taking up too much space on your phone. It's pretty straight forward to set up, and you'll be greeted by the following screens which are pretty easy to see what is needed. It's basically the obligatory account needed for most applications that require some type of access via web. I use my gmail account so I'm able to activate it solely from the device. This also helps out if you ever have your device replaced or upgrade, and you are allowed to have more than one device tied to your Mobile Defense account, but more on that in a bit. After setting everything up, be sure to restart your device so that it will hide the application from the launcher. I'm not sure if this also hides it on the Nexus One since I don't own one and haven't heard any reports of anyone using this app on it.






Once you are all set up on your device, you'll be able to log in to the website on another phone or computer, and see what has been going on with your phone. You can actually see when a new sim card has been placed into your phone and still locate and disable the phone. The main screen you see is the Activities screen, but clicking on the Maps button will show the following screen, notice I have two device currently set up on Mobile Defense. All you need to do is hit connect to phone and you'll be able to get connected within a matter of minutes, assuming your GPS is turn on. This has been long debated on whether it was better to leave gps off unless needed or just leave it on. GPS on Android doesn't actively search for a signal like bluetooth or Wifi will, so having it turned on should not drain your battery. I have not noticed any difference in battery life leaving it on, and it actually helps locate you quicker when you need it since you don't have to enable it every time you want to use something.





The location is pretty accurate, although right now it is showing my phone next door instead of at my house, that could be due to where in my house the phone is. This is where applications like GPS Tracker come in handy as it has shown to be slightly more accurate in the past. On the above shot you can see the different options available. You can use streetview to load up a what the location looks like, as long as it's available where your phone is. Details allows you to send the details of the track to your email or another email.

It will even show your battery status bar so you can view your battery status and current network connection. As you can also see, there is an option to lock the phone, this will enable to pattern lock on the device, but there is a catch. Currently you already have to have a pattern saved, otherwise once locked, any patten will unlock it. Sending an alert to the device plays an annoying high pitched alarm, and even allows you to type a custom message that will display. You also have the option of having to enter a pin in order to stop the noise, of course doing so may prompt the person that has the device to quickly pull the battery so it may be best to use this option only once you have located the device but can't actually see it.


So far I haven't had to use the application to find my lost phone, but it is nice to know that should something ever happen to my phone, I'll be able to easily locate it as long as the phone is powered on. The downside to the application is that when locating the phone a message is sent to the phone in the form of a text. It only displays on the status bar and disappears rather quickly so someone may be able to see it for the split second it's on the screen. Of course, users of Chomp SMS and Handcent SMS have a way around this, add the address to your contacts and then from the messaging app add it to your blacklist. The message is still received, but the person having your phone will not be able to see it.

If you've had a success story with using this app, be sure to sound off in the comments.