[WARNING][You MUST Reset Google Wallet When Switching ROMs!]

If you're doing a factory reset, switching to another ROM, or restoring to stock and you're currently using Google Wallet, you MUST reset your Google Wallet app by going into Settings --> Reset Google Wallet in the Wallet app, or you will permanently lock out your secure element and will never be able to use Google Wallet again - you will have to get a new phone!

This is because your Google Wallet app is married to the secure element with a unique crypto key when you first set up Google Wallet on your phone and if you wipe your phone without first resetting Google Wallet, that key will be lost forever, rendering the secure element useless.

Performing a Google Wallet reset will unmarry the app from the secure element and reset it to its original state so that it can accept a new Google Wallet installation when you wipe your phone and then restore it to stock.

I had to get a new Note 2 because of this, thankfully I had phone insurance. If mods could sticky this, it would be great!

Google "secure element has stopped responding" if you don't believe me.

Engadget article explaining the problem: http://www.engadget.com/2012/05/29/google-wallet-factory-reset-problem/

Android Community article on the issue: http://androidcommunity.com/more-google-wallet-problems-phone-reset-bricks-service-20120529/

Phandroid article explaining the problem: http://phandroid.com/2012/05/28/and...allet-a-factory-reset-could-break-it-forever/

AndroidCentral: http://forums.androidcentral.com/ht...here-google-wallet-root-unlock-sensitive.html

A PSA thread on XDA warning of the issue: http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?p=26587822

Another XDA thread where Google and the Money Network both say you need a new phone if this happens: http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=1472117

Yet another XDA thread where someone bricked their phone: http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=1721222

For the naysayers, just because you've never seen something happen, doesn't mean it's not true or it will never happen to you. I just bricked my Note 2 and had to get it replaced under phone insurance. Went from the NoWiz ROM to MA7 stock rooted, wiped the phone in the process (my guess is Wallet stores the crypto key in /.android.secure, which gets wiped when you do a factory reset), installed Wallet on the clean MA7 ROM and got the dreaded "The secure element has stopped responding E00" error. NOTHING could make it reset. At all.

Also, to those who say Wallet stores things in the cloud now - false. Wallet stores its very own virtual card number in the secure element, which is what gets transmitted via NFC when you touch your phone to the reader. That number is then linked in the cloud to your actual credit cards, so your actual card numbers are not transmitted to the retailer. If Wallet stored nothing on the phone, it simply wouldn't work, period. Also, if Wallet stored nothing in the secure element, then it would work without it and not throw the "secure element not responding" errors, so it definitely stores something there, which is why it's important you don't brick it!

-EViL-KoNCEPTz- said:

Considering the only thing stored in the secure element now is your unique encryption algorithm that every NFC app uses to identify your device, and absolutely nothing to do with wallet is stored in the element any longer, everything you've said is false. The element gets borked when you lose your encryption algorithm and nothing else, it happens when you NV data or partitions get corrupted. For one thing the secure element isnt even in a user accessible partition its in a secured "read only" partiton similar to your efs and NV data which means any wipes from recovery will have 0 effect on the element. Wallet has nothing to do with the element breaking since google patched the app to store to cloud.

I like to break stuff!

Click to expand...

Click to collapse

Hey I have a Secure Element that is not responding and have spent the last week going through the google wallet v96 reversed "source code". To say that it is a "Read-only" memory partition I believe to be false. I will explain more in an edit to follow.

Edit: So the Secure Element has 4 states, ACTIVATED, CLEAR, LOADED, LOCKED, determined by a Byte Value stored in the SE memory. Also depending on which version you downloaded of the newest release of the app (there are two version I have found a ~5mb app and an almost 11mb version that TrevE sent to me while he was helping me troubleshoot this.) The fact that the SE has 4 states determined by a byte string that is pulled during Reset, proves that the SE is not read only, also the fact that nfc_extras is the key to access and having rw permissions to the SE also proves that it is not read only. While some of your info is stored in the cloud (which is the fifth item that is cleared out during reset with method TSA_NOTIFY_WALLET_RESET) there is still data being written to the SE.

I am currently working on modifying the Wallet app to attempt to hard restore a working state of the SE based on the permissions and items that the Wallet has access to changing.

So as to the legitimacy of whether the Wallet is what locks you out, all I can speak on is my own experience (locked out) and the research I have done. I was on MA5 and setup wallet, did not do any transactions just setup cards and stuff, did a wipe to flash my latest Synergy test build and afterwards was Secure Element Stopped responding which is a sting that is thrown during WAIT_SECURE_ELEMENT_UNLOCKED method.

You're welcome to your own beliefs though. It's America

Sent from my SPH-L900 using xda premium

siraltus said:

And yet you will not cite even a single word or sentence of mine that's actually wrong. Welcome to my ignore list.

Click to expand...

Click to collapse

Considering the only thing stored in the secure element now is your unique encryption algorithm that every NFC app uses to identify your device, and absolutely nothing to do with wallet is stored in the element any longer, everything you've said is false. The element gets borked when you lose your encryption algorithm and nothing else, it happens when you NV data or partitions get corrupted. For one thing the secure element isnt even in a user accessible partition its in a secured "read only" partiton similar to your efs and NV data which means any wipes from recovery will have 0 effect on the element. Wallet has nothing to do with the element breaking since google patched the app to store to cloud.

I like to break stuff!

Just wanted to say.....those links are before google switched to storing the info on the cloud....wallet was updated in Aug 2012 to start storing on the cloud...ive used Billards restire without wiping wallet several times and it still works. I thank you OP for trying to help but if you look at the link I posted earlier google switched to storing the info on the cloud.

Sent from my SPH-L900 using Tapatalk 2

We don't know what kills secure element yet.

Sometimes it dies even when you do reset.

Sometimes it dies for no reason at all overnight by itself when you made no change at all.

And usually it doesn't die even when you do flash and/or factory reset without clearing first.

Nice sounding theory but doesn't fit the facts.

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