Forgot code to access phone. Any way to recover pictures on it?


Question

A little while back, I passed on my Samsung Galaxy S6 to my mom. She used the fingerprint scanner to get into the device. Today, her battery died for the first time and because you can't use her fingerprint the first time after a restart and she forgot the backup password, we cannot access the phone.



I thought there was an option to reset the device using her Google account after entering the wrong code a few times, but that option doesn't appear unfortunately. I read about Samsung's Find my Mobile, and while I was using the S6 I activated it and I can find it in my list of phones when I login with my Samsung Account, but I am unable to unlock the phone with it because it says it's offline at the moment (it's online, but I assume it says that because it isn't activated anymore, I reset the phone before I gave it to my mom).



I know that I can enter recovery mode to factory reset the device. The thing is that she really wants the pictures on it. Is there any way at all for me to get the pictures from the device? If I'm correct, it was fully stock.


Answer

Alright, I managed to get all the files of the device! Here's how to do it in this particular case:




  1. Like suggested by someone else in the comments, I flashed TWRP to my Galaxy S6 using ODIN.

  2. After flashing TWRP, I turned the Galaxy S6 off and I booted to recovery by holding the Volume Up + Home button + Power button simultaneously.

  3. I installed Google's Android SDK Manager and from within the SDK Manager, I installed the SDK Platform Tools. This allowed me to use ADB.

  4. From within the Platform Tools folder, I held shift and right-clicked an empty space to open a CMD window in that folder.

  5. I connected the Galaxy S6, which was still in TWRP, to my computer.

  6. In the CMD, I ussed the command adb devices to check if it was recognized. It was.

  7. Lastly, I used the command adb pull /sdcard to pull ALL DATA from the internal storage.



Hopefully this will help others with the same question!



PS: I didn't provide any download links because I'm not sure if it's allowed. But like always, Google is your friend.


Topics


2D Engines   3D Engines   9-Patch   Action Bars   Activities   ADB   Advertisements   Analytics   Animations   ANR   AOP   API   APK   APT   Architecture   Audio   Autocomplete   Background Processing   Backward Compatibility   Badges   Bar Codes   Benchmarking   Bitmaps   Bluetooth   Blur Effects   Bread Crumbs   BRMS   Browser Extensions   Build Systems   Bundles   Buttons   Caching   Camera   Canvas   Cards   Carousels   Changelog   Checkboxes   Cloud Storages   Color Analysis   Color Pickers   Colors   Comet/Push   Compass Sensors   Conferences   Content Providers   Continuous Integration   Crash Reports   Credit Cards   Credits   CSV   Curl/Flip   Data Binding   Data Generators   Data Structures   Database   Database Browsers   Date &   Debugging   Decompilers   Deep Links   Dependency Injections   Design   Design Patterns   Dex   Dialogs   Distributed Computing   Distribution Platforms   Download Managers   Drawables   Emoji   Emulators   EPUB   Equalizers &   Event Buses   Exception Handling   Face Recognition   Feedback &   File System   File/Directory   Fingerprint   Floating Action   Fonts   Forms   Fragments   FRP   FSM   Functional Programming   Gamepads   Games   Geocaching   Gestures   GIF   Glow Pad   Gradle Plugins   Graphics   Grid Views   Highlighting   HTML   HTTP Mocking   Icons   IDE   IDE Plugins   Image Croppers   Image Loaders   Image Pickers   Image Processing   Image Views   Instrumentation   Intents   Job Schedulers   JSON   Keyboard   Kotlin   Layouts   Library Demos   List View   List Views   Localization   Location   Lock Patterns   Logcat   Logging   Mails   Maps   Markdown   Mathematics   Maven Plugins   MBaaS   Media   Menus   Messaging   MIME   Mobile Web   Native Image   Navigation   NDK   Networking   NFC   NoSQL   Number Pickers   OAuth   Object Mocking   OCR Engines   OpenGL   ORM   Other Pickers   Parallax List   Parcelables   Particle Systems   Password Inputs   PDF   Permissions   Physics Engines   Platforms   Plugin Frameworks   Preferences   Progress Indicators   ProGuard   Properties   Protocol Buffer   Pull To   Purchases   Push/Pull   QR Codes   Quick Return   Radio Buttons   Range Bars   Ratings   Recycler Views   Resources   REST   Ripple Effects   RSS   Screenshots   Scripting   Scroll Views   SDK   Search Inputs   Security   Sensors   Services   Showcase Views   Signatures   Sliding Panels   Snackbars   SOAP   Social Networks   Spannable   Spinners   Splash Screens   SSH   Static Analysis   Status Bars   Styling   SVG   System   Tags   Task Managers   TDD &   Template Engines   Testing   Testing Tools   Text Formatting   Text Views   Text Watchers   Text-to   Toasts   Toolkits For   Tools   Tooltips   Trainings   TV   Twitter   Updaters   USB   User Stories   Utils   Validation   Video   View Adapters   View Pagers   Views   Watch Face   Wearable Data   Wearables   Weather   Web Tools   Web Views   WebRTC   WebSockets   Wheel Widgets   Wi-Fi   Widgets   Windows   Wizards   XML   XMPP   YAML   ZIP Codes