Phone Alone is a remote monitoring solution for Symbian Smartphones that allows you to control your device and protect your private data when your phone has been lost or stolen. Keep reading to learn how it works.
Overview
Phone Alone is an all-in-one solution for remotely controlling and protecting confidential data on your Symbian Smartphone from another pre-configured device when it is not accessible. It not only allows you to access the data stored on your device but you can set your device as an auto-answering and call forwarding machine. This can be done by calling your Smartphone from a pre-configured number that initiates the remote control process and allows you to control your phone by pressing the keys on this device. Another way of controlling your Smartphone remotely is by sending a text message command that further allows you to perform various actions like recovering your contacts, listening to your voice mail, locking your device and much more.
Phone Alone is developed by Mobisophy and can be purchase from their website for $19.95. The developers also allow you to download a free trial version from their website after selecting your device make and model. The program can be installed on all Smartphones that operate on Symbian S60 3rd and 5th edition platforms. Further, the app can be easily installed on any compatible device by connecting it to a desktop PC and then using Nokia PC Suite to run the download trial version setup file.
Examining Phone Alone App
After completing the installation, I started the app by going to my Smartphone’s Main Menu → Applications → Phone Alone which directed me to its main screen that displayed that the application was unactivated. To activate the app, I pressed the left soft key on my device to access the options menu and selected the ‘Activate remote code’ option which guided me to a new screen where I could enter the remote control code. Selecting the ‘Play locally’ option from the options menu further displayed two more options namely ‘Answering machine’ and ‘Managing voice menu’.
The ‘Answering machine’ option then allowed me to perform various actions according to the voice prompts. Similarly the ‘managing voice menu’ option allowed me to leave voice messages on my device or access the voice menu to perform various actions. The ‘Lock phone’ option allowed me to remotely lock my device and the ‘Settings’ option further directed me to a new screen where I could configure the app settings according to my convenience. The ‘Hide’ option allowed me to close the main screen of the app while it kept running in the background.
Other options in this menu are Register, Help and Exit.
Next, I pressed the ‘Settings’ button where the ‘Remote control code’ option allowed me to lock the phone remotely by entering a code. The next option is ‘Managing phone numbers’ and here I could add my secondary mobile number so that I could control my Symbian Smartphone from this number.
Finally, the ‘Volume’ tab allowed me to configure the play voice volume of the local or remote voice menus and ‘Prompt for billable event’ option allowed me to enable or disable billable event prompts.
Final Verdict
I really loved this applications main premise and I think that the concept of Phone Alone app is great. It can definitely come in handy while safeguarding the private and confidential data stored on your Symbian device when your phone has been lost or stolen.
The app worked smoothly most of the time, but while using it for several days; I also realized that sometimes it failed to recognize a voice prompt properly. I think the developers need to work more on this issue to make it a more functional product.
I also think that the app is quite reasonably priced at $19.95 and if it was as functional as advertised by the developers on their website, it would have been a best-selling product.
I always recommend my users to download and test the trial version before buying the final product and in this case where I am a little doubtful about the functionality of this app, this becomes an absolute necessity.
SOURCE: Mobisophy