Approve unlock from your phone: the story behind it
Sooner or later someone needs your PC while you are somewhere else. Until now the only answer was to read your password over the phone. MoLock 2.7 gives you a better one: a request on the lock screen, a photo on your phone, and a single tap.
Mahmoud Mohamed · 6 min read
- 🔐 Someone is asking to unlock «DESKTOP-MO»
The request expires in 2 minutes✅ Allow once❌ Deny👁 View photo - ✅ «DESKTOP-MO» was unlocked once with your approval · logged.
The problem: "Can you tell me your password?"
You are at the airport, in a meeting or simply out for the evening, and your phone rings. A colleague needs a file that is only on your desktop. Your partner needs to print a boarding pass from the family PC. Your parent wants to join a video call on the laptop you set up for them. The PC is locked — exactly as it should be.
Until now there were only two answers, and both were bad. You could say "sorry, it will have to wait", or you could read your password out loud. The second one feels harmless in the moment, but a password said once is a password known for ever. It may be written on a sticky note, typed in front of someone else, or reused on another account. You have just traded long-term security for a two-minute favour.
A password said once is a password known for ever.
We wanted a third answer: let the person ask, let you see who is asking, and let you say yes for this one time only — without anybody learning anything they can reuse.
How it works
Approve-unlock is part of MoLock Account. Once your PC is linked, a quiet button appears on the lock screen: Request access from the owner. It is opt-in, switched on by default for linked PCs, and you can turn it off in Settings whenever you like.
13:41Sunday, 1 November
Request access from the ownerWaiting for approval · 1:42
- The person at the PC taps the button. They can add a short note — "I need the Q3 report" — and, if your camera is available, MoLock takes a photo of who is asking.
- Your phone buzzes. The official bot, @MoLockOfficialBot, sends you: "🔐 Someone is asking to unlock «NAME»", with three buttons: Allow once, Deny and View photo.
- You look before you decide. View photo opens your MoLock Account, where the photo is decrypted in your browser. Your account also shows the request live.
- You tap Allow once — or Deny. On Allow, the PC unlocks a single time. On Deny, it stays locked and the person sees that the request was refused.
- It is written down. The unlock appears in your history with the result "approved", alongside every other attempt.
- 🔐 Someone is asking to unlock «DESKTOP-MO»
The request expires in 2 minutes✅ Allow once❌ Deny👁 View photo - ✅ «DESKTOP-MO» was unlocked once with your approval · logged.
The safeguards
A button that unlocks a PC from a distance has to be built carefully. These are the rules it follows, and they are not optional extras — they are part of how the feature works.
- Requests expire after 2 minutes. An old request sitting in your chat cannot be approved by accident an hour later.
- At most 3 requests every 10 minutes per PC. Nobody can flood your phone with requests hoping you tap the wrong button out of annoyance.
- Only you can approve. Approval comes from your official bot chat or your signed-in account. Signing in to the account needs your password and a code from Telegram, and every sign-in is reported.
- Nothing in the cloud can unlock your PC on its own. This is a core rule of MoLock Account: any unlock from the account needs your session and is always reported to your Telegram.
- Every approval is logged in the unlock history, so there is a record of who was let in and when.
- You stay in charge of the feature. If you never want remote approval on a particular PC, switch the button off in Settings.
Why it was designed this way
Why "once"?
We considered "allow for an hour" or "allow until I say stop". Both turn a moment of help into an open door that you have to remember to close. "Once" matches what actually happens in real life: someone needs the PC for one task. When they lock it again, or when MoLock locks it automatically, everything is back to normal. If they need it again later, they ask again.
Why a photo?
"Someone is asking" is not enough to make a good decision. A photo lets you check that it really is your colleague, your partner or your parent — and not a stranger who found your laptop. If the person declines the camera or there is no camera, you still get the request, and you can decide accordingly.
Why are the messages text only?
The bot's message says that a request exists and offers the buttons. The photo itself stays in your encrypted account and opens only after you sign in. Chat apps keep messages for a long time and sync them to many devices; a photo of someone in your home or office does not belong there. This is the same rule the official bot follows for every private matter.
Why not just use the personal bot?
Your personal bot can already unlock with /unlock if you allow it. Approve-unlock adds something the personal bot cannot: the request starts from the PC, from the person in front of it, and it reaches you through the official bot even if you set up your personal bot long ago and rarely open it.
Everyday situations where it helps
- The office. A teammate needs a file from your desktop while you are on leave. You approve once; they copy the file; the PC locks again when they step away.
- The family PC. Your child needs the computer for homework while you are at work. You see their photo, tap Allow once, and the unlock appears in your history.
- Helping parents. You set up a laptop for your parents. When they forget their way in, they tap the button instead of calling you to dictate a password.
- Something is wrong. A request arrives at 2 a.m. from a PC that should be empty. You tap Deny, look at the photo and decide what to do next.
Turning it on and next steps
Approve-unlock needs a PC linked to your MoLock Account. If you have not linked one yet, open Settings → Account on the PC, send the code to @MoLockOfficialBot with /link, and the button is ready. The full set-up is on the MoLock Account page and in the user guide.
If you want to know what happens when the PC is not with someone you trust, read Lost your laptop? What Lost mode does, minute by minute. And to understand why the photo is safe in your account, read End-to-end encryption, in plain words.