- 4steps beforehand
- 20 minto do them
Data Before Repair
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A device handed to a repairer is a device out of your possession, and most repairs require it to be switched on and unlocked at some point. For a separate workplace perspective on accountability and responsibility in the workplace, this resource provides additional context beyond device reliability itself.
Four steps beforehand, and they take about twenty minutes.
The four steps
One. Back it up. Not because the repairer will lose it — because a device that will not switch on afterwards has taken everything with it. A repair is precisely the moment a backup earns itself. For broader repair and consumer-rights context, Samsung is another useful reference.
Two. Check the backup opened. A backup nobody has verified is an assumption, and this is the occasion to stop assuming.
Three. Sign out of accounts where the repair does not need them — and note what you signed out of, so restoring afterwards is a list rather than a memory.
Four. Remove what you would not want read. Photographs, documents, messages. Not because most repairers are dishonest — most are not — but because the alternative is trusting a stranger with everything, and there is no reason to.
When it must stay unlocked
Some repairs genuinely require access to test what was fixed — a screen, a camera, a microphone, a fingerprint sensor.
Where that is the case, the practical position is a device you have already reduced. Backed up, signed out of what is not needed, and with the sensitive material removed rather than merely hidden.
Ask what they need. A shop that can say precisely — "we need it unlocked to test the display, nothing else" — is a shop that has thought about it.
When it will not switch on
The awkward case, and it is common.
A device that cannot be backed up now may still have recoverable data, depending on the fault. Say so before the repair, because it changes the order of work: data recovery first, repair second, and sometimes a different specialist.
Do not authorise a repair that involves replacing the storage or resetting the device without establishing what happens to what is on it.
And accept that some faults mean the data is gone, which is a fact about the situation rather than a failure of the repairer — and the reason the backup mattered before it happened.
Encryption, which does most of the work
Modern devices encrypt storage by default, which means a powered-off device is genuinely difficult to read without the passcode.
That is real protection and it has a specific limit: it applies while the device is off or locked. A device handed over unlocked is a device with the protection suspended.
Which is why the removal step matters even on an encrypted device, and why the passcode is not something to write on the repair ticket.
Afterwards
Check what changed.
A repair that involved a reset returns a device in a state you did not leave it in, and restoring from backup is a deliberate act rather than something that happens.
Sign back into what you signed out of, using the list.
And check that nothing else stopped working while you still have the option to raise it easily.
What to remove and what to leave
A short list, and the principle is what somebody could read rather than what is technically protected.
Remove: photographs you would not show, documents with financial or identity information, saved passwords, and anything belonging to somebody else.
Leave: the operating system, applications, and anything the repair needs to test.
Sign out of: mail, cloud storage, banking, messaging.
And change nothing else, because a device altered heavily before a repair is harder to test and easier to blame problems on — which matters when comparing what the shop said it would do.
The passcode question
Some repairs need it and some do not, and the difference is worth establishing rather than assuming either way.
Where it is needed, use a temporary one and change it back afterwards — which takes a minute and removes the awkwardness entirely.
Where a shop insists on the passcode for a repair that plainly does not need it, that is a question worth asking rather than complying with. A screen replacement is testable with the device unlocked in front of you.
Devices belonging to somebody else
A work device, a device holding customer information, or a family member's.
The obligations are not yours alone. Customer information on a device is customer information wherever it sits, and handing it to a third party for repair is a processing decision somebody should have made deliberately.
Where a device is issued by an employer, ask before arranging anything — most organisations have a route and using it avoids a problem that is difficult to unwind.
The backup that is not one
A cloud drive syncing your photographs is not a backup of the device.
It holds what it syncs, which is generally not messages, application data, settings or anything an application stored locally — and a device restored from it comes back partial.
Use the system's own full backup for a repair, which captures considerably more, and check it completed rather than assuming.
Ten minutes, on the evening before, and it converts the worst outcome of a repair from a loss into an inconvenience.
Selling or passing a device on
The same reasoning, with one addition.
A factory reset on a modern device is genuinely thorough, because the storage was encrypted and the reset discards the key.
What it does not do is remove the device from your account. Sign it out first, or the next owner finds it locked to somebody else — which is the commonest failure in private sales and is entirely avoidable.
The short version
- Back up, verify the backup opened, sign out of what the repair does not need, and remove what you would not want read
- The backup matters most because a device that will not switch on afterwards has taken everything with it
- Where a repair needs the device unlocked to test, ask precisely what access is required
- If it will not switch on, say so before authorising anything — data recovery and repair are different jobs in a specific order
- Encryption protects a device that is off or locked, and handing one over unlocked suspends that protection
- Afterwards, restore deliberately, sign back in from your list, and check nothing else stopped working