Last week, Google announced its long-awaited service for tracking Android smartphones and tablets. Today the Android Device Manager has started rolling out to devices on Android 4.2.2 and up via a software update, and Google has a new webpage for tracking from a browser.

Once the manager is installed on your handset, you can log into your Google account on the web to view the location of your device anywhere in the world. Google says it can track a device within about 20-30 meters in most cases. You can’t remotely send a message to a lost device yet, but you can cause it to ring at maximum volume even if it’s on silent.

Google will also let you remote wipe a device if push comes to shove, so that if you have no chance of recovering your device, you can at least delete all of your personal data from it so that it doesn’t fall into someone else’s hands.

To enable remote wipe, you must turn on factory reset on your Android device. To do that, open up the Google Settings app, tap “Android Device Manager,” and then tap “Allow remote factory reset.”

• SourceAndroid Device Manager