An old friend goes missing, and you receive her phone in the mail...

[RangerWickett]

Curious how people would react to this scenario. An old friend has been living overseas, and you hear there's a crime spree happening in the city she's in. So you call to check on her, but it goes to voicemail. You email her, and get no response. Then, three days later, you receive a package -- postmarked before the crime spree started -- that contains her smartphone.

What do you do?

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Me? I'm a black guy...and i know how these movies work!

I'm taking that phone to the cops IMMEDIATELY! If I do anything else, I'm either their first suspect or the bad guy's next victim.

 

[El Mahdi]

I'd take the phone to my genius computer-hacking friend that lives in a crappy apartment, and have him find whatever secret files, pictures, or other info on the phone that was the real reason for her disappearance...then after he's killed, I'd run until I hook up with a loner, disillusioned ex-Navy SEAL whom after the bad guys kill his dog, helps me take the fight to the bad guys, find my freind, and save the world from THEM* in the process.


*THEM = Totally Horrible Enemy Masses

 

[Wednesday Boy]

Interesting....

I'd check to see who she called last or most frequently to see if anything stood out there. If she was still logged into her e-mail I'd check which e-mails were unopened to set up a timeline of when she stopped communicating. And I'd fiddle around with it to see if there are any messages to me that would explain why it was sent to me.

 

[Aeolius]

They're rebooting Romancing the Stone ?

 

[Loonook]

They're rebooting Romancing the Stone ?

Yes! I knew it sounded familiar.... But I couldn't think of anything but Michael Douglas. And then it went to Catherine Zeta-Jones, then... Well, I just sort of wandered from there.

If I received such a thing I would probably immediately hand it over to someone to check out, and they could hopefully get in touch with the consulate or similar entity to fix this whole issue. It's just difficult to ponder as I know you want me to jump on it, but... It would be a possible piece of evidence and I just don't want to end up in the second act of Law and Order: International Weird Crimes Unit.

Slainte,

-Loonook.

 

[UngainlyTitan]

Curious how people would react to this scenario. An old friend has been living overseas, and you hear there's a crime spree happening in the city she's in. So you call to check on her, but it goes to voicemail. You email her, and get no response. Then, three days later, you receive a package -- postmarked before the crime spree started -- that contains her smartphone.

What do you do?

Can I access the phone? Cause if not then i am not going to try some amateur cracking. Go to the cops explain the situation and see if they can help or at least retrive information from the phone.
If I can access the phone then go to a nearby large town and have a good look at the phone contents, pay particular attention to last called list. email. photos, documents. Talk to the police and see if they can help.
Contact the relevant consular offie and see what they can do.
Contact the persons family and perhaps pool resources to hire a private detective.

 

[Kaodi]

Since I have become in the last year a complete tub of lard, and I have no combat skills, after looking over the phones contents myself (including checking around the battery, and plugging any cards it has into a computer first) I would probably end up having to give it to someone with actual qualifications to handle. I would help that person as much as I could, and if everything went sour in the end, dedicate myself to revenge.

 

[Piratecat]

What I DON'T do: call up a mutual friend and say "I think I know why our friend disappeared, but there's just one thing I have to check out. I'll meet you later."

Narrative causality turns that into an immediate death sentence.

 

[Zephrin the Lost]

text this to every number in the phone:

I don't know who you are. I don't know what you want. If you are looking for ransom, I can tell you I don't have money. But what I do have are a very particular set of skills; skills I have acquired over a very long career. Skills that make me a nightmare for people like you. If you let my friend go now, that'll be the end of it. I will not look for you, I will not pursue you. But if you don't, I will look for you, I will find you, and I will kill you.

because, DAMN, how often will you get a chance to say that?

--Z