Bitcoin Forum

Other => Beginners & Help => Topic started by: peterlustig on November 20, 2013, 09:06:28 PM



Title: Retrieving BTC from Android phone with broken screen
Post by: peterlustig on November 20, 2013, 09:06:28 PM
Title basically says it all: My phone with around 0.15 btc in the Mycelium wallet installed on it has a broken screen. I can get access to the SD card but not to the phone file system. I think i left USB debugging switched on so there should be a chance to access the filesystem and wallet, but I could use some starting hints. Thanks for any clues.  :)

edit: Downloading ADB tools now, let's see if I can find the wallet. Hints to where it should be found would be useful. ;)


Title: Re: Retrieving BTC from Android phone with broken screen
Post by: Sir Alan on November 20, 2013, 09:18:17 PM
I take it that you have not made a safe copy of your private key(s) to enable the BTC to be retrieved in the event of your phone being lost, stolen, or (as in this case) broken?


Title: Re: Retrieving BTC from Android phone with broken screen
Post by: escrow.ms on November 20, 2013, 09:19:41 PM
Read and follow 2nd step.
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=309895.msg3336738#msg3336738

I Hope This will solve your problem.


Title: Re: Retrieving BTC from Android phone with broken screen
Post by: exstasie on November 20, 2013, 09:26:31 PM
Is there away to connect your Mobile screen to another screen, like to a monitor or TV somehow?


Title: Re: Retrieving BTC from Android phone with broken screen
Post by: peterlustig on November 20, 2013, 09:27:38 PM
I take it that you have not made a safe copy of your private key(s) to enable the BTC to be retrieved in the event of your phone being lost, stolen, or (as in this case) broken?
Indeed, I "forgot" the btc ("only 0.15btc lol") until the screen broke...

Read and follow 2nd step.
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=309895.msg3336738#msg3336738

I Hope This will solve your problem.
That looks very useful, big thanks already, will report back! :D
Is there away to connect your Mobile screen to another screen, like to a monitor or TV somehow?
Nope, too old (Xperia S).

edit: Can't access the file, possibly because the phone isn't rooted (I also get "no permission" errors when trying to list all files)? Or maybe I had Electrum not Mycelium installed (been a few months)... But since I can't list the content of the data dir, seems it's a permission problem.

edit2: The phone was rooted, su can do wonders. Turns out I had bitcoin spinner installed, will report back!  :D


Title: Re: Retrieving BTC from Android phone with broken screen
Post by: peterlustig on November 21, 2013, 12:58:00 AM
Thankfully the phone was rooted and USB Debugging was on or I probably wouldn't have had a chance. I did the following:

1. Download ADB Tools http://www.mediafire.com/?kovh575e97hu910
2. Install ADB driver if you haven't yet http://www.chip.de/downloads/Universal-ADB-Treiber_61437026.html
3. Open a cmd prompt and type adb shell
5. Type su, the $ should become a # if you have root access
6. cat /data/data/com.miracleas.bitcoin_spinner/shared_prefs/KeyManagerCache.xml
7. The private keys begin with <string name="bitcoin pri key 1">, copy those and import them into your favorite wallet (i used blockchain.info since Multibit was picky about the key format).
???
8. Profit!  ;D