<p>A bitcoin app would not stop your phone from being formatted, so it must be something else.</p>

<p>That said, if you still have bitcoin in a wallet on your old phone, then you should definitely transfer it to a wallet on your new phone (or maybe just recreate your old wallet on your new phone). Just open up the bitcoin wallet, and transfer the funds / export the seed phrase.</p>

<p>Retrieving the bitcoin won't fix your problem of being unable to format the phone, but you should definitely not sell your phone until you have done so!</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-11-20T21:21:11.990Z
2017-11-20T21:21:11.990Z
chytrik
<p>I recently replaced my iPhone.  A friend tried to erase the old phone to use it for himself but was told it still had a live bank account - I assume my bitcoin account.  How can I retrieve my account and bitcoin?  I still have my old phone but not much else - anything I can do?</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2017-11-20T16:12:48.910Z
An app on your old iPhone could not have prevented it from being erased. It was likely your Apple ID account on the old iPhone that prevented it from being restored. Regarding the bitcoin, which wallet were you using on the old phone? Luckily you still have it, because then you can do a backup and use that backup on the new phone. Also, depending on the wallet, there might be a seed phrase (usually 12 or 24 simple words) that if you possess you will be able to resurrect the wallet on the new phone.
Eric Allam
<wallet-recovery>
Need help retrieving bitcoin from an old phone
Brian
# Need help retrieving bitcoin from an old phone

(Asked by: username_0 on 2017-11-20)

I recently replaced my iPhone. A friend tried to erase the old phone to use it for himself but was told it still had a live bank account - I assume my bitcoin account. How can I retrieve my account and bitcoin? I still have my old phone but not much else - anything I can do?

**Tags:** wallet-recovery

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: An app on your old iPhone could not have prevented it from being erased. It was likely your Apple ID account on the old iPhone that prevented it from being restored. Regarding the bitcoin, which wallet were you using on the old phone? Luckily you still have it, because then you can do a backup and use that backup on the new phone. Also, depending on the wallet, there might be a seed phrase (usually 12 or 24 simple words) that if you possess you will be able to resurrect the wallet on the new phone.  

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## 1 answers

### Answer by username_2 on 2017-11-20. Score: 1

A bitcoin app would not stop your phone from being formatted, so it must be something else.

That said, if you still have bitcoin in a wallet on your old phone, then you should definitely transfer it to a wallet on your new phone (or maybe just recreate your old wallet on your new phone). Just open up the bitcoin wallet, and transfer the funds / export the seed phrase.

Retrieving the bitcoin won't fix your problem of being unable to format the phone, but you should definitely not sell your phone until you have done so!


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