Retrieve icloud email address from locked phone

[GGLNickG]

My company, a small software developer, has a large number of iOS devices one of which was icloud locked by one of our software testers and which we cannot now get access to. The problem is that he set up a huge number of icloud/iOS accounts as part of his testing process and he/we don't know which test email address he used to lock this particular device.

Before you accuse me of theft or lying, note that I am not after the password, only the email address the phone is locked to as we know he will have used an address based on our domain so can request a password reset which we will definitely receive.

Any ideas how we can identify the full email address used or get a password prompt sent to whatever address it is? We have looked extensively but come up with nothing as every solution requires either the password or full knowledge of the exact email address used. Apple, unsurprisingly, refused to help in-store on two occasions in case you suggest this.

I am not interested in hacking/jailbreaking the device.

Many thanks in advance for any non-sarcastic answers :>

 

[keysofanxiety]

If you have the original receipt then Apple will unlock it for you.

There's no way to retrieve the original email address. This is to prevent phishing, as you can appreciate.

 

[GGLNickG]

If you have the original receipt then Apple will unlock it for you.

Actually the original receipt has to include either a serial number or IMEI otherwise Apple will refuse to help. Unfortunately all our test devices were bought from ebay and the vendor of this particular phone (a mass refurb company) neither provides this in their receipts nor keeps any records of these numbers.

There's no way to retrieve the original email address. This is to prevent phishing, as you can appreciate.

I feared as much although I still find it very odd that you cannot request a password reset to be sent to the registered email address without having to disclose the email address. This reset request could not be used for phishing in any way as far as I can tell.

 

[keysofanxiety]

Actually the original receipt has to include either a serial number or IMEI otherwise Apple will refuse to help. Unfortunately all our test devices were bought from ebay and the vendor of this particular phone (a mass refurb company) neither provides this in their receipts nor keeps any records of these numbers.

Ah yeah, you won't have any luck with eBay bought ones. Needs to be the original original purchase receipt.

Other than logging into every iCloud account he would have made and deauthorising the devices, there's nothing that can be done. Sorry.

 

[GGLNickG]

Understood. Thanks for clarifying this.

 

[eyoungren]

My company, a small software developer, has a large number of iOS devices one of which was icloud locked by one of our software testers and which we cannot now get access to. The problem is that he set up a huge number of icloud/iOS accounts as part of his testing process and he/we don't know which test email address he used to lock this particular device.

Before you accuse me of theft or lying, note that I am not after the password, only the email address the phone is locked to as we know he will have used an address based on our domain so can request a password reset which we will definitely receive.

Any ideas how we can identify the full email address used or get a password prompt sent to whatever address it is? We have looked extensively but come up with nothing as every solution requires either the password or full knowledge of the exact email address used. Apple, unsurprisingly, refused to help in-store on two occasions in case you suggest this.

I am not interested in hacking/jailbreaking the device.

Many thanks in advance for any non-sarcastic answers :>

Apple has slightly more leeway for business. If you can prove the device is owned by the business legitimately they can unlock it for you.

As far as hacking/jailbreaking - it's good you aren't interested and here's why.

To jailbreak a device you need to have the device unlocked and at the springboard. That's a real problem if you can't even get in to the device. And if you CAN eventually get in to the device then there is no longer any need to jailbreak it to get in to the device.

So, jailbreaking is irrelevant anyway - even if you DID want to do that.

 

[GGLNickG]

Thanks for the replies all. In fact I've now managed to find the email address thanks to an extremely lucky guess based on the tester's more orderly email account naming conventions (he had some very random ones too). It only took 45 guesses so I should count myself lucky.

However lessons have been learned about testers and keeping track of test accounts!

 

[BrianBaughn]

Good result!

I'm thinking that if these were actual email accounts setup at the email provider you could have figured it out that way. Also, most email providers allow the setup of a "catchall" address that will gather all email sent to "anything@thedomainname" where "anything" is NOT an actual email account at the domain.

 

[GGLNickG]

Good result!

I'm thinking that if these were actual email accounts setup at the email provider you could have figured it out that way. Also, most email providers allow the setup of a "catchall" address that will gather all email sent to "anything@thedomainname" where "anything" is NOT an actual email account at the domain.

Yup, the catch-all for our domain caught the password reset email and once I had reset it, I logged into icloud and found the associated device.