Google announces Android Device Manager, available later this month
Google announced a new app today called Android Device Manager, which will let you locate and ring your lost phone, or remotely wipe it. It will be available for all devices running Android 2.2 and above.
It will presumably be integrated into Google Play Services – the background app that Google now uses to push major updates to a variety of phones, regardless of the version of Android they are running. Google has started focusing more on this kind of update, since manufacturers and carriers have been so slow to push new updates. This allows Google a little more control and gives it greater ability to get new features like Device Manager out to more devices.
There will also be a companion app that you can download on all your other Android devices, that will allow you to manage your entire device collection. Granted, other services like Lookout have long offered this functionality, but it oftentimes comes with yearly subscription fees, or it’s not always as reliable as it should be. It’s nice to see Google offer this as an officially-supported service, and should hopefully give everyone a bit more peace of mind.
This also means that apps like Lookout will have to get a little more creative with what they offer, since the competition is getting intense.
[Google]
