topic Re: Z3 rebooted to factory settings while having it in my pocket, photos lost on SD card in XPERIA archive

Z3 rebooted to factory settings while having it in my pocket, photos lost on SD card

oky — Sat, 11 Oct 2014 19:11:12 GMT

My 3 day old Z3 rebooted to factory settings while having it in my pocket. I was out for a five hours walk and have used it serveral times during the walk to take photos. They were stored on the SD card. Battery was on 73%. At the end of my trip I noticed it asked for my pin code to unlock the sim card. I used my newly set pincode for simcard and it worked fine. The telephone was set up with screenlock as well, but that has disapeared together with all my installed programs and my photos and videos on the SD card. The lock screen goes automaticlay on after 15 sec so I find it strange that I should be able to push the right buttons, in my pocket, by just walking, to perform a factory reset?

Any suggestions on why and how to restore my photos on the SD card?

Re: Z3 rebooted to factory settings while having it in my pocket, photos lost on SD card

Uliwooly — Sat, 11 Oct 2014 19:22:45 GMT

Perhaps you deleted the SD card by accident, there are programs that might recover your photos such as

wondershare data recovery

Re: Z3 rebooted to factory settings while having it in my pocket, photos lost on SD card

oky — Sat, 11 Oct 2014 19:27:07 GMT

thanks, i will check it out to recover data on the SD card. But is it possible to factory reset the Z3 by pushing volume and power buttons? I read it was possible on Z2.

Re: Z3 rebooted to factory settings while having it in my pocket, photos lost on SD card

Thommo — Sat, 11 Oct 2014 19:31:24 GMT

You often find on some devices (Not sure about the Z3) with a sim pin, If the wrong code is entered X amount of times it will auto factory reset as a security precaution as it will think it's lost or stolen and the person who has it now is trying to access the information

Re: Z3 rebooted to factory settings while having it in my pocket, photos lost on SD card

oky — Sat, 11 Oct 2014 20:21:01 GMT

On the z3, if you type wrong pin code 3 times, it locks the simcard and you need the PUK (Personal Unblocking Key) code to unlock it. I am uncertain what happens if you type the PUK code wrong three times....

Re: Z3 rebooted to factory settings while having it in my pocket, photos lost on SD card

SergioPL1 — Sun, 12 Oct 2014 13:41:16 GMT

@oky wrote:
On the z3, if you type wrong pin code 3 times, it locks the simcard and you need the PUK (Personal Unblocking Key) code to unlock it. I am uncertain what happens if you type the PUK code wrong three times....

After typing PIN bad for 3 times you have 10 tries for PUK. After that your SIM will be permanently locked and need to be replaced.

But maybe screen didn't lock for some reason and you managed to enter wipe option in settings without knowing it?

Do you use any apps for tacking your phone? Like antivirus, exchange account etc. Those apps have ability to remote wipe the device. Maybe it was a bug in any of them?

Re: Z3 rebooted to factory settings while having it in my pocket, photos lost on SD card

oky — Sun, 12 Oct 2014 14:44:45 GMT

Thanks for your comments. I guess its either happend in my pocket, while walking and in one way or another wiped out all data, programs and settings, back to factory settings, or as you say, the outlook setup might have sent a wipeout "order"to my phone. Last option is that there is something wrong with my phone, and it will happen again. Anyway, I will start to see if I can get out any photos from my SD card and then start installing all programs etc.

Regards, Oky

Re: Z3 rebooted to factory settings while having it in my pocket, photos lost on SD card

olivierz3 — Sun, 12 Oct 2014 14:48:48 GMT

Hello, I have exactly same issue. I noticed it when un-plugging the charger. The phone never dropped, and I guess this happened when I opened the side flap to connect the charger. I hoped that phone would be resistant, I am very disappointed. Is Sony going to do something here?

Re: Z3 rebooted to factory settings while having it in my pocket, photos lost on SD card

oky — Sun, 12 Oct 2014 15:11:27 GMT

OlivierZ3, could you specify your problem? Did your phone reset to factory settings and wiped all your photos on your SD card as well?

Rgds,

Oky

Re: Z3 rebooted to factory settings while having it in my pocket, photos lost on SD card

BrunoHenriques — Sun, 07 Dec 2014 12:23:32 GMT

Same happened to me twice already, it's clearly caused by software and not hardware, i.e. it's not just the phone losing data but the SD card also gets formatted.

And although we consumers handle wipe privileges to more than one entity (Sony myXperia, Android Device Manager, your company providing Exchange ActiveSync access), I never had similar problems with my previous Samsung Note 2 >:/

Sadly none of these services AFAIK keep or display their device wipe history.

I do love the phone but I'm considering going Cyanogenmod when possible to avoid this behaviour.

I'm willing to support Sony with the necessary data to reproduce the issue, if I could only find a specific circunstance that could have triggered it 😕

Regards,

Bruno

Re: Z3 rebooted to factory settings while having it in my pocket, photos lost on SD card

SergioPL1 — Sun, 07 Dec 2014 21:35:24 GMT

Maybe you have PIN count wipe enabled? Then it might be possible to faulty trigger factory wipe. Altough this bug was in Android 5.0 (and corrected in 5.0.1) not in 4.4.4.

Re: Z3 rebooted to factory settings while having it in my pocket, photos lost on SD card

dmzm — Sun, 04 Jan 2015 03:21:33 GMT

I've had this exact problem. The phone has done this 4 times since I bought it in mid-October. I took it to my telco (Virgin Mobile Australia)'s shop and they advised that it was likely a software problem and that I should try doing a manual hard reset myself, and see if the problem reappears.

It is a tough issue because you can't reproduce it - the device resets randomly, once I was listening to Spotify and it reset, the phone powers off and then the Android/spinning cube shows up like a normal hard reset. First time I thought it was just a fluke but it after I caught it actually in the process it looks like some sort of factory wipe bug. Lollipop should be released in Australia next week so i will hopefully not see this issue again but if I do will have to send back to Sony and see if there is anything they can do.

Anyone else seen this issue? any other suggestions?

Re: Z3 rebooted to factory settings while having it in my pocket, photos lost on SD card

dmzm — Sun, 04 Jan 2015 03:23:45 GMT

Note that at all times the phone was either stationary or locked, so I highly doubt it is a PIN/PUK issue or an accidental menu command issue. I also considered whether someone had hacked by Sony account and requested a remote wipe but normally an email is sent when this occurs right?

Re: Z3 rebooted to factory settings while having it in my pocket, photos lost on SD card

ER-NY — Mon, 05 Jan 2015 17:43:10 GMT

This also happened to me yesterday. I went to check my phone and for some odd reason, it was off. The phone had been on for about 5 hours or so prior to me checking. When I turned on the phone, the set up wizard came up. That's when i noticed the internal and SD card were completely wiped. The phone has never been dropped and requires a pass code to get in so it couldnt of happen while it was in my jacket. Has anyone gotten a response from Sony?

Re: Z3 rebooted to factory settings while having it in my pocket, photos lost on SD card

leareth — Wed, 28 Jan 2015 09:21:53 GMT

I have had this issue today, walking with phone in pocket. Next minute, my phone is wiped and I've lost everything. Is there any way to recover data?

Re: Z3 rebooted to factory settings while having it in my pocket, photos lost on SD card

leareth — Thu, 29 Jan 2015 04:14:03 GMT

This was Sony's answer to my question:

Sophia: Hi, just looking into this for you won't be long.

Sophia: I have had a read of the thread and due to the low number of people posting on the forum over the past year I ca confirm this is not a common problem. If you have already tried what has been advised on that forum and the issue has not been resolved, I advise running a software repair on your handset as this is most liekly to resolve the issue yoyu are experiencing.

X: that is Sony's answer?

Sophia: Yes.

X: and what about all the lost data and pictures

X: this is not an isolated incident

Sophia: I understand that it has been experienced before but there has been an extremely low number of people who have experienced the issue, it is not a known fault. As previously suggested, a software repair is likely to resolve the issue for you.

X: how do I recover the data that has been lost?

X: I must say, I was hoping for more support, from a support chat

Sophia: Unfortunately once the data has been lost, there is no way to recover it

I am very dissappointed in the level of care from Sony. Took a long time to get the final reply, and it's apparently not a known fault, so it's my problem.

If it's happened to multiple people, it's a fault.

Same problem with the Z1 Compact?unintended reboot factory settings while in pocket

Iglebush — Thu, 23 Apr 2015 09:42:35 GMT

Both me, and my neighbour have the Sony Compaxt phones.

I have the D5503 (Z1 Compact).

My neighbour has the Z3 Compact.

We both experienced this factory reset this week.

First my neighbour this Sunday, while on a hiking trip in Norway.

Then I experienced the same while the phone was in my pocket Tuesday in Bangkok.

We talked to Sony Support in Norway today, they registred our call, but had no knowledge about anything similar happened before.

I hope more people will register similar events and maybe somebody can shed light on how this can be possible!

Re: Same problem with the Z1 Compact?unintended reboot factory settings while in pocket

AVO — Fri, 03 Jul 2015 10:30:46 GMT

Hi all,

Just had the same happening to me. On my bright new Xperia Z3+.

Just came back from South-Africa, taking countless picturen of breaching whales, all gone...

No Google pics backup...

Maybe it has something to do with location? I read it happens to people who travel, or just got back? Also running ms exchange for mail, so that could be an option too. Eitherway, no more faith in the phone now, reading that it often doesn't stay at 1 mishap.

If anyone has got any new update on this, I would like to hear it!

Re: Same problem with the Z1 Compact?unintended reboot factory settings while in pocket

fokemon — Mon, 06 Jul 2015 14:39:19 GMT

Same here with my Z3, 6 months old. Both times it has happened in my pocket, and both times phone has been stuck into some process, heating and eating battery. I am stunned that Sony isn't taking responsibility for the issue. My phone was crypted and protected with PIN, and still it did it. Shouldn't be possible without PIN!!!

I have contacted local Sony (FI), waiting eagerly to hear their response... Only advice I got from CS was to reboot again with PC companion, but that didn't work...

Re: Z3 rebooted to factory settings while having it in my pocket, photos lost on SD card

NandoSD — Wed, 19 Aug 2015 21:04:00 GMT

Hello

Just another user having the same issue with my brand new Z3 (less than one month old)

I had no issue for 20 days using the phone without a MicroSD, but as soon as I put it in, I have had the issue twice in 3 days.

This is not so an isolated issue as Sony claims, since the forums are full of comments of this isse since the very beginning Z3 came out

SONY - Any solution?