USSD Codes: Cheat Codes for the Smartphone?
by Ted Y.
I wanted to share these neat pieces of information I learned back from studying for my CompTIA A+, in the section for diagnosing mobile phones.
Depending on your hardware manufacturer and your mobile network operator, you can use the keypad to send what are called "Unstructured Supplementary Service Data" or USSD codes to communicate certain aspects directly to you!
For the sake of this article, I will be doing this on my Samsung Galaxy A51.
I should start with a disclaimer that there are malicious sites that can give you false codes, and some will go as far as to show codes that could wipe the phone and its data. I do not advise or condone using USSD or MMI codes as a means of any cybersecurity offensive.
With that out of the way, let's ask, "What is Unstructured Supplementary Service Data?"
Unstructured Supplementary Service Data is a means of communicating back to a carrier's service provider. So, in these cases, I can communicate directly to the service provider that there are some things I would like to access. These are different than MMI (or Man-Machine Interface) codes as these are more standardized across all phones.
One example, is *#06#, which will present your IMEI (or International Mobile Equipment Identity), which is a unique identifier across all mobile phones.
Now, if you've got an iPhone, that's essentially the only one you can run, but, if you've got a phone running Android, then you have more to explore.
(Note that for Android 14, you may have to go into Settings > Security and Privacy > Disable Auto Blocker as this will prevent USSD and MMI codes from working.)
For example, on my phone, if I run *#0*#, then I can launch the "Test Menu" and from there, I can now start testing to make sure parts of my smartphone work if I suspect parts of it are not working.
Another example is *#0228* which I can use to do battery calibrations.
As you can see, we can do quite a bit of troubleshooting, but let's say I want to quickly and completely wipe the phone, just factory data reset the whole thing. We can just do *#*#7780#*#* which will do a complete factory data reset.
I got most of the codes for this phone, from a website, mobilexfiles.com/phones/samsung/samsung_galaxy_a51/secret_codes, but I encourage looking at whatever resources you can out there. Each phone manufacturer runs it differently, but with this information you can take it back from them!
Take back your phone!
#06# - IMEI number *#*#3646633#*#* - Engineering Mode (for smartphones based on MTK processor) [or *#*#54298#*#*] *#*#4636#*#* - Display information about phone, battery and usage statistics *#*#225#*#* - This code show the number of festivities and events in your calendar *#*#426#*#* - Check the connectivity between the FCM server and the mobile devices *#0011# - Service Mode *#0808# - Change USB settings *#9900# - Dump mode *#9090# - Diagnostic configuration *#0*# - General Test Mode *#2663# - TSP / TSK firmware update *#12580*369# - Software and hardware info *#0283# - Audio loopback control #7465625*638*# - Insert network lock key code *#*#759#*#* - RLZ Debug UI (Device ID, Activation Status, some ping stuff, and few other things) *#*#36245#*#* - This code show email debug info *#*#8255#*#* - Google Talk Service Monitor in Android mobile phones will monitor Google Talk host address and port, your Google JID, your device ID, GTalk connection status, your connection history *#*#64663#*#* - Hardware Test (version, screen, LED, sound, vibrate, all sensors) *#*#7780#*#* - Used for a factory data reset *2767*3855# - The firmware of the device is completely reinstalled *#*#232338#*#* - View Wi-Fi MAC address *#*#34971539#*#* - Display full information about the camera (or *#34971539#) *#*#1234#*#* - PDA and phone firmware info *#*#7594#*#* - Changing the power button behavior Enables direct power-off once the code enabled *#*#1472365#*#* - For a quick GPS test *#*#1575#*#* - Full GPS test *#*#197328640#*#* - Enabling Test Mode for service activity *#*#0283#*#* - Packet Loopback test *#0228# - Battery calibration *#*#232339#*#* - Wireless LAN tests [or *#*#526#*#*] *#*#0*#*#* - LCD display test Code *#*#3264#*#* - RAM version *#*#1111#*#* - FTA software version *#*#2664#*#* - Touchscreen test *#*#0588#*#* - Proximity Sensor Test Mode *#*#8351#*#* - Enables voice dialing logging mode *#*#232331#*#* - Show Bluetooth Test Mode *#*#232337#*# - Shows Bluetooth device address in Samsung Galaxy A51 *#*#7262626#*#* - Field test *#*#0289#*#* - Audio test [or *#*#0673#*#*] *#*#0842#*#* - Device test (vibration test and backlight test) *#*#2663#*#* - Display device's touchscreen version *#*#44336#*#* - Displays build time and change list number *#*#4986*2650468#*#* - PDA, phone, hardware, RF call date firmware info *#*#8350#*#* - Disables voice dialing logging mode *#*#2222#*#* - FTA hardware version *#*#273283*255*663282*#*#* - For a quick backup to all your media files