A question of second-hand phone mishaps -- whose fault?

[Mgn]

Person A sells their unlocked iPhone to Person B, because Person A is up for an upgrade and no longer needs it, and Person B needs the unlocked phone to use on a prepaid plan. They make a fantastic agreement, money changes bank accounts, and the transaction proceeds.

Person B receives the iPhone in the mail about a week after Person A sends it out, and finds that the iPhone contains over 500 contacts and several hundred pictures. Person B doesn't want to use the factory reset feature in case it messes with the unlocked status of the phone (because it is imperative that this phone is unlocked), and figures that Person A has had over a week now to disclose whether or not they needed anything from the phone. Person B figures, too, that most people clear their phones of things they need before they sell them, and typically have any important information backed up somewhere tangible, especially a businessperson like Person A is.

As such, person B deletes the 500 contacts and several hundred pictures, and thinks everything is hunky-dory, because no notifications come up on the iPhone to indicate otherwise.

Person A angrily contacts person B later in the day because all of their contacts and pictures are now gone. It turns out that Person A had all that stuff stored exclusively on iCloud and apparently had not backed it up anywhere solid, and hadn't cleared the iPhone they just sold Person B of the connection to that iCloud account. Person B has had zero experience with iCloud, being an Android user for many years, and feels awful for inadvertently deleting so much important information (with no indication from the iPhone to suggest that it was even happening), but somehow feels they're not totally at fault here.

Your view?

[Gobnait]

You're not liable for their lost data. Heck, there was probably a specific instruction in their cloud user agreement to keep a backup of the data stored there. Heck, his keeping the phone linked to the account was like leaving something valuable lying on your carseat in a bad neighborhood with the door unlocked. It would be different if you stole the phone and did it immediately, but there would still be nothing to be done.

[Mgn]

Yeah I felt terrible But there's nothing I can do, and I didn't think that he'd ONLY store his stuff on the iCloud, and my deleting it from an associated phone would cause that information to cease to exist across all of his Apple devices. It's just odd. I have all my contacts written in a book, and they're saved to my actual phone storage, not just my iCloud. Ergh. I'm just so baffled that the iPhone wouldn't even notify me that that would happen upon deleting information.

[guest439437484421]

say "Sorry, s*** happens" and move on. Obviously neither one of you knew it would happen (hell, i have an iphone and didn't know that would happen), so there's no reason for anyone to be mad at the other or feeling upset or anything. If they were really that important they would have been backed up prior to the phone being sent.

[silverpeacock]

If they didn't clear their phone before sending it to you, it is their own damn fault. Sorry, but no nicer way to put it.

[EmCee]

Yeah I felt terrible But there's nothing I can do, and I didn't think that he'd ONLY store his stuff on the iCloud, and my deleting it from an associated phone would cause that information to cease to exist across all of his Apple devices. It's just odd. I have all my contacts written in a book, and they're saved to my actual phone storage, not just my iCloud. Ergh. I'm just so baffled that the iPhone wouldn't even notify me that that would happen upon deleting information.

It's not your responsibility. That being said - when I delete photos from my "photo stream" (which means they are backed up on iCloud) it DOES tell me it will delete them from EVERYWHERE. That being said, I back all photos up with iPhoto and my contacts get synced with Google. Person A is dumb

[cracked_belle]

It's not your responsibility. {...} Person A is dumb

^that

wtf did they expect? that you would keep all of THEIR data on YOUR phone???