After being in IT for a decade it never ceases to amaze me how incompetent people are when it comes to tech.

At my first gig in NYC I worked at a smaller financial firm (about 100 people) and every mid-level and above employee was given a work phone. One time I got a ticket that said "my smartphone is being really slow, can someone please take a look?". I went up there and it was a guy in his 40s (I was like 30), suit and tie, I think he was a Junior VP or something like that. He gave me his Galaxy S5 and I looked at the RAM usage and it was all taken up by Chrome. I opened up Chrome and he had 99+ tabs open, I told him that was the reason and he said "Oh.. I thought those automatically closed when I exited (he meant switched apps, not killing the process)...", I told him they didn't and started swiping them away, after the first few it was about 90 tabs of (teen) porn 🤣. I had to stand there in front of him, straight faced for a good few minutes cleaning up his porn. Afterwards I said "it should be better now, just remember to close your tabs when you're finished with them." and left. Once I got in the elevator I nearly pissed myself laughing so hard.

Sad but true.

As one of those IT people (who was taught on punched cards), I'd had some hope that by the 21st century only GenX and Boomers would have this issue.

That young adults don't know this stuff is very frustrating.

Most people cant explain how a toaster works - it may as well be magic to them.

I had a friend leave her laptop with me for some maintenance. I think it was probably a reformat or something? I return her laptop, and she asks "have you seen my photos in folder X on the desktop?". I responded "no, why would I". She went "oh, such a shame" and made a "cartoonish" pouty face. From the conversation that followed, they were "raunchy".

Like, bruh, I won't be looking into your data. Want me to see something, send it to me straight, don't expect me to snoop around lol

That's suspicious.
I have a theory...
Are you sure they weren't hitting on you, placing nudes on the background and handing you their phone so they knew you had access to their phone number (during the transfer) so they were willing to pay the price of switching phone to get a callback?

I seriously can't think of another reason than that to put nudes as a freaking background...

Phones these days are encrypted. If you ever set up a pin/password to unlock your phone, that means it's encrypted. Just make sure your phone is powered off or restarted (or battery drained, if the off button isn't working), before you drop it off at the repair shop.

No one can access your files in this state - not even the manufacturer (unless there's backdoor, but that's a different topic - but even then, there are many "secure folder" type apps you could use to encrypt sensitive data).

If it's just a broken screen, Google your way in learning how to repair it yourself.

Or, find a shop that will repair it in front of you the whole time. Pay extra if need be

Or, if the material is too sensitive and the above options aren't viable:

1. accept the loss and destroy the phone. Or,
2. accept that whatever is in there will be viewed

The good thing with a problem like this is that your options are limited. So there's not a whole hell of a lot of decision tree making you need to do.

Remote wipes are possible. Log into your Apple/Google account, figure out how to find your device, then perform a remote wipe.

Not immediately wiping a used device that hasn't already been wiped is such a hazard. If they didn't wipe it, they're probably technologically illiterate enough that it's loaded with tons of malware too.

Actually the last few times, Verizon has called me to upgrade for little or no money, sometimes paying more for my old phone than I did when it was new. I asked once why they do it, and it is some sort of loyalty program.

Sometimes they offer crazy promotions. Verizon had a any pixel for a pixel 7 deal. My boss traded in a pixel 1 for like $500 off a 7.

you can run octoprint on old phones, that's pretty fun.

And unless you actually destroy the storage, you are in the exact same situation. Also, I assume someone taking a hammer to a device is not recycling it properly.

Phones have a factory reset for a reason

How else are you going to release the magic smoke?