Apple is always on the brink of new features and taking advantage of the latest technology and they’ve done it again by offering a remote wipe feature for all iPods, including the iPhone and the iPod Touch. The remote wipe ipod touch feature does just that – it erases everything on your iPod even though you’re not holding it in your hands doing so. Why on earth would you want to destroy all those files that it took you so long to collect? Maybe your iPod has been stolen and you want to disable it from being used. This could be important, especially if it’s an iPhone that you’re dealing with, or if you can get into your iTunes account through your iPod, because it could end up costing you a lot of money.
For this reason, you might want to erase everything on your iPod, lock it up, and wait until it’s back safely in your hands so that you can start reloading it with all your wonderful contacts, videos, songs, you get the idea. But this feature does much more than just shut down your device should it go wandering off in someone’s pocket. It will also do really cool things like sound a solar alarm should you misplace your iPod and desperately need to find it. Simply follow the sound, and find your iPod. But in the case of erasing all of your data from your iPod Touch, is it really smart to remotely wipe your device?
Many people are scared to try the remote wipe feature because well, who wants to erase all of the information from their machine? But, if you do want to try it, you can find step by step instructions here. Also note that the remote wipe feature will also require you to set up a MobileMe account, because this is how you will communicate with your iPod when you’re not holding it in your hot little hands.
Once you have the MobileMe account, you’ll also need to use the feature on the website Find My iPhone. This is the part that will locate where your iPod is and bring up a map of its location. Lastly, you will need a lock on your iPod Touch or iPhone. Without a lock, anyone can go into your Find My iPhone feature and disable it, rendering the whole thing useless.
It is important to know the risks involved with remotely wiping an iPod Touch because it’s a lot of information that could be erased unnecessarily. On the other hand, in times when you really need your iPod Touch not to perform, this could be a lifesaver feature.
That’s not what this article, from Apple states. http://www.apple.com/mobileme/features/iphone.html. While it does only talk about the iPhone in the “Remote Wipe” section of the page, the title states that it’s for the iPod Touch and the iPhone. So I don’t think it’s all that nuts to assume that it would do both.
The MobileMe trace and wipe features are not available for the ipod touch….that is just nuts.