Worried about losing or having your iPhone stolen?  Well if you didn’t subscribe to Apple’s MobileMe Service there is a less expensive service or should I say a FAR less expensive alternative. It’s the iHound and it tracks lost and stolen iPhones.

 

Although iHound has been around for quite a while now, however it didn’t get the credit it needed because it could not run in the background and so it could not transmit the location of the lost iPhone unless it was activated. Something you probably don’t think about doing prior to finding that your iPhone is missing.

 

Well with the iOS4, iHound can not communicate automatically and at regular intervals and it doesn’t have to be running to do so. What this does is send a location data to iHound’s servers every few minutes.

 

All one has to do is go online and sign into the iHound site to see where the last transmitted location was. There is an option that can send a notification with your custom message and even with an actual spoken alert.

 

Another awesome option is that you can choose to activate a siren, which could assist you in finding the misplaced phone and or startle the person that took it. The siren can be deactivated only from the site so the person that stole your phone can’t even access the volume to turn down the siren.

 

The cost is very reasonable for the app is $3.99 which includes a three-month subscription or you can choose up to a two year subscription for $19.99. All the subscriptions are available as in app purchases.

 

Another good point about IHound is that it can assist parents in tracking just exactly where their children are!

 

IHound however does not offer a remote wipe out option to erase your iPhone’s memory, which may be an important to some but for most it won’t be a deal breaker.