Forgotten Apple Password

[iloveglee]

I wonder if anyone can help me to help a friend. she has had an ipad for a couple of years, and knowing nothing of how to set it up, was assisted by a neighbour who worked in IT. he set it all up, including an apple account, e-mail, facebook etc. everything worked perfectly until her daughter took it upon herself to upgrade it to IOS7. Frankly i think this is more trouble than its worth, but whats done is done, and as a result of the upgrade, all the id's, passwords etc. have disappeared. unfortunately the neighbour has moved away and he never told her this information, and because everything was working ok, thought she wouldnt need to know, and never asked him. now, she knows only the e-mail address her set up, and used for the apple, and facebook user names. she does not know the password, and trying to reset it through apple is not working. she cant reset it by having the password sent to the e-mail because she doesnt know the e-mail password, and doesnt know how he set up the security information with apple. clearly she knows the answer to some of the questions but the apple site wont accept these as she doesnt know exactly they were input, lower case, spaces/no spaces etc. she doesnt know either whether a 'rescue' e-mail was set up in the apple account, and if there was, doesnt know what it is!!! sounds like an impasse to me. i have set her up with a gmail account so that she can use e-mail, but short of setting up a new apple account, and new facebook and starting from scratch i dont know what to suggest. apple tell her that she can have a new apple id but everything she has bought using the first account, wouldnt be available to her for any other device.

[Old_Geezer]

Not the wisest of moves, not knowing / noting passwords. I can only think to contact the neighbour, but they may not have saved the data anyway. Chalk it up as one of life's lessons ?

[Old_Geezer]

Does Apple have a help desk one could call or e-mail or even visit ?

[Tuvok]

Has she tried phoning Apple?

She may not know all the security details, but if she has previously bought stuff via iTunes and App Store using her credit card......

If there is an Apple Store that she could go to, with proof of identity, credit card statements etc. that might help.

[Tuvok]

https://www.apple.com/uk/support/contact/

[woofgang]

The web ids and passwords should all be saved in safari preferences, security. They shouldn't have been removed by upgrading, mine haven't. to see them instead of a row of dots, she will need to put in the password she needs to unlock the computer, if she doesn't use one then pressing enter should do it.

If I had been the helpful man I would have left a document on the computer (maybe in notes) listing all the info needed, has she searched for anything like this?

[iloveglee]

we did think about the credit card - unfortunately she now has a new one with a different bank and has destroyed the old one. lifes lesson yes, by all means get someone to set you up if you are not able but make sure they give you all the necessary information just in case. but this is a problem with people who have no clue about such thinks, they think that once its set up it will work forever with no problems and no need ever to have to reset anything. oh if only! knowing the neighbour, i think the chance of him remembering this information is fairly slim. her last best hope, if she cant find anything in safari preferences, is the grandchildren. she thinks they have put apps on from time to time and (madly imo) gave them the password. theres a chance one of them may remember. didnt know about safari preferences, i dont use safari as i find it slow.

[woofgang]

has she looked in notes and documents for anything that lists her info?

[Tuvok]

Just a thought - if she does need to have proof of previous credit card, would a credit check report show it?

[Sycamore3House]

If you go to Settings/iTunes, App Store (left hand side) at the top it will say Apple ID. Tap this and you will see iForgot. Tap,that and it will enable the Apple ID password to be reset. That will be a start. get her to write it down. Then get her to reset all her other passwords to the same for Facebook etc.

[Mick-the-Miller]

Apple tech support are very helpful, get in touch with them and they'll sort you out.

A thing to bear in mind that has caught me out in the past is that Apple passwords must have at least one upper-case character.

[iloveglee]

thinking about having the usernames and passwords in safari preferences, surely if they were, when she tries to get into her facebook account, the password would already be there without having to input it. when she opens the facebook app, the user name is there, saved, but not the password. needless to say she doesnt know the password, is assuming that it is the same as the one for the me e-mail, and for apple. she does remember that the apple password had to contain a capital letter, but nothing else. this was all set up so long ago, even if she had been told, they are not written down anywhere, and she just cannot remember. to reset the apple password, this has to be retrieved from a link sent to the attached e-mail. she cannot get into the attached e-mail because she doesnt know the password for that either. this is mainly what is causing the frustration. i think that, for the moment, she is not especially bothered about accessing her apple account as she now has another usable e-mail for all the other uses. facebook is a problem because she is pretty sure the e-mail attached to it is also the one attached to apple - i believe she has only ever had the one e-mail address. so the password retrieval for facebook also has to go to an email she cant get into. she did say that the friends on facebook that she is bothered about are all family members who she can get to send her a friend request if she sets up another facebook account. that would be an option. we do have a couple of apple stores locally and calling in there and speaking to one of the techies would also be an option. i have always found them to be very helpful, but of course at present, being near to christmas, they are usually heaving.

[Sycamore3House]

Another idea is if she can access settings/passcode/turn it off this may help bypass having to out in a code.

[iloveglee]

she doesnt have a passcode to get into the device. its just that for some reason, everything that has been previously set up, with its user names and passwords, has had them wiped by the upgrade. i believe from some forums people have had this problem. because all these things have been operating perfectly well without inputting a password she hasnt seen the need to know, or remember them.

[meglet]

As Tuvok said, she needs to call Apple support. My Apple account was hacked from someone in China and I tried use the iForgot option but, not only had my password been changed by the hacker, but Apple wouldn't accept the answers I had set up on iForgot. I called Apple and explained the situ and they were really helpful. They managed to confirm my identity then asked me to call back 24 hours later (down to their security procedures) and allowed me to change my password. Call Apple.

[woofgang]

If she doesn't have a passcode to enter the device then the passwords saved in safari preferences won't need a passcode to see them either. I ask again, has she searched through notes and documents to see if the bloke saved a list on the machine?

[woofgang]

she can book a genius bar appointment, she won't have to queue in the apple store
https://www.apple.com/uk/retail/geniusbar/

[iloveglee]

OK there are no passcodes, id's or anything else in safari preferences. the upgrade appears to have wiped everything. it had even wiped her wi-fi settings so she had to re-set the network key for her router. she has looked in notes, nothing there (she has no documents). thanks for everybodys suggestions, i think where she is now is, create a new apple account, create a new facebook account and start again. worry about the stuff she has bought in the old apple account when she needs to