Hey everyone,
I'm reaching out to see if anyone knows if there's any hope left for my daughter's Apple account. She's 11 and recently fell victim to a hack after clicking a link that looked like a game on the app store. Almost immediately, her device was locked, and her passcode stopped working.
Even though her account is tied to a family group with restrictions, the hackers somehow managed to change her device passcode, the account password, and the recovery phone number. I, as her parent and the Family Group Organizer, received zero notifications about these changes, neither through email nor alerts on my Apple devices.
Now, we can't access her phone at all, which is her only device associated with the account, and I can't reset her Apple account password because it requires the new phone number set by the hackers.
When I contacted Apple, they helped me remove the Activation Lock but then said that without the recovery phone number, there's no way to retrieve the account. Has anyone dealt with a similar situation or have any ideas on what we could do? Thanks!
5 Answers
The device passcode is critical for making changes, and it's strange that you received no alerts to your parent account. Do you think it was left unattended for a while? That could explain everything.
It seems odd that such a big change could happen without any alerts sent to you. Clicking a link alone doesn’t usually get someone hacked like that. Maybe there was more to the story, like her entering her account info somewhere?
Have you tried accessing Family Sharing settings from your iPhone? You might be able to change her password directly since she’s under 13. Follow this path: Settings > Your Name > Family > [Daughter's Name] > Apple Account & Password. Just a thought!
I wish it worked that way! Unfortunately, once they changed the recovery phone number, not even a parent can change the password anymore.
To get her phone back, you'll definitely need proof of purchase, and it's likely you'll have to set up a new account since her old one seems unreachable. Once an account is locked this way, it usually stays that way unless you know the details that were changed.
That’s great that you got the activation lock removed! But yeah, getting back into the account is proving tricky given that new info was set up by them.
This whole situation is pretty wild! I can't believe they could change all that info with you as the parent. I might rethink how my kids' accounts are set up after this.
I get why you'd think that, but she's really young and I doubt she knew the secure password—she just had her screen passcode.