This has been a known issue since 2021 or longer! Samsung, this is unexeptable! Imbarassing for Samsung, INDEED! Either you stand behing your name or not! This either needs fixed or we should get a new phone at the expence of Samsung for not fixing this issue, since 3 years! I cannot loose my phones data to perform a hard reset, common, Samsung, you are better than that! Fix it, or replace my phone.
Allow me to go into detail. I was on Chat GPT and all of a sudden this screen appears to enter a password I never created that is at least 4 characters or more including a letter. I cannot do anything on my phone. I cannot see incoming textes, I cannot make any calls that are not emergencies. I cannot even turn off my phone or restart the phone without this password, I never created! I can only recieve calls. I allowed the battery to fully empty so I can see if it reset, but nothing.
I'm afraid your only remedy to unlock your phone is to do a factory reset through recovery mode. Yes, you will lose your personally created or downloaded data, but the rest of your apps and settings will be intact upon restoration of your backup. You should have been backing up personal data to an external device or cloud service on a regular basis anyway as a matter of routine. - if it's important to you, you make sure it's backed up six ways from Sunday. It's not just because somehow some phones suddenly develop a password (I find it hard to believe it does this on its own absent accounts being compromised), but because phones get lost, stolen, or damaged/bricked. Samsung has no way to unlock your phone, as pins, passwords and biometrics reside solely on the device itself. Even if they gave you a replacement phone (which will never happen), you would still lose your data, as there would be no way to transfer data over to a new device from a locked phone. Since your phone is not broken, just locked, don't expect any kind of replacement as your current phone is still completely intact and usable, just locked.
I suspect that somehow your phone was compromised by chatGPT or some malware that somehow got on your phone either by clicking a bad link or downloading a suss app, as a screen will NEVER pop up asking you for a password or pin in the middle of doing something, especially if you never set one. The only time you are required to enter a PIN or password is a) when you first unlock your phone (only on the lock screen) or b) you open an app where you have an account and need to enter credentials or you go into security settings. You would never be asked to enter a password if you are already on your device and it's in use.
Strange this happened. My wife's phone did the same thing this weekend. Now I have 5 try left before it gets wiped. She used the biometric finger lock since day one. A Update powered off the phone. Now asking for 4 characters and a 1 letter??
Is it asking her to set a password that requires at least four characters, including a letter? Or is it saying one is already set and you need to enter it? It sounds as if it's asking her to set a password and enumerating the parameters. PINs don't usually require anything but numbers. I understand that phones where people have been using the secure folder now require a lock screen password, not just a biometric. Since I already have a password lock and do not use the secure folder, this hasn't affected me.
In any case, she can (and should) have multiple unlock methods set in case one fails, and especially if she ever intends to put the phone in lockdown mode if traveling. Law enforcement and TSA can compel you to unlock your phone via biometric but need a court order to compel you to open via a password.
