SF's district attorney: iOS 7's Activation Lock offers 'clear improvements' in anti-theft tech
Smartphone thefts have been on the rise over the last several years, particularly in big cities such as New York, London and San Francisco. Last week, San Francisco District Attorney George Gascón and New York Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman announced that they were going to test new anti-theft smart phone measures unveiled by Apple at WWDC.
Called "Activation Lock," the feature will allow devices running iOS 7 to prevent thieves from turning off the Find My iPhone feature or wiping the device clear without first entering the user's iCloud password.
The San Francisco Examiner has followed up on the district attorneys' testing and reports that Gascón said that Activation Lock has made "clear improvements" in anti-theft smartphone measures. "I'm very optimistic that they came and were willing to share their technology with us," Gascón told the SF Examiner, after testing iOS 7's Activation Lock in addition to Samsung's Lojack for Android.
Though pleased with both, he noted that Microsoft and Google have yet to offer their own solutions. Gascón also said he will keep pressing the issue until all major smartphone manufacturers release similar technology.
Activation Lock will ship as part of iOS 7 this fall.
