The data in your personal smartphone is not safe. It can be used against you.
Hackers are targeting smartphones and convenient media, civility the fact that there is a steep rise in the market of both these gadgets. Just few days ago, a security firm did an experiment in which they proved that the deleted data from the smartphone can be retrieve easily.
The retrieved data was containing maturity selfies, call records, personal credentials, bank statements, undressing women etc. This experiment raised a question of safety of a smartphone and it’s data.
Harish Rao who is a college lecturer said, “My phone started behaving weird all of sudden. It used to heat up for no reason. It totally freaked me. I went to Jagdish Market. It charged few hundred rupees to restore the phone. The guy at the store warned me not to install malicious third party apps.”
Mani K writes, “My Android phone is hacked. It’s operating random functions automatically. It opens apps, messages, triggers calling all by itself. I feel worried and angry. Please help.” The tips that he received on social media included, telling cybercops, uninstalling apps, removing battery of the phone etc. There are plenty of such stories about fear and tricks among smartphone users.
Aslam Khan, who is a cellphone technician at Abids deals with 10-15 hacked cellphones cases everyday. He said, “It all starts when you download and install an application. It’s like giving keys to your home, all information on hard drive. Simple gaming app also accesses very crucial user data like call records, identity of user and cellphone etc. Some can even trigger mic or a camera. I perform factory reset and advice customers to take care while browsing the internet or free WiFi zones.”
Every year over 100 million users change their cellphones in India. Cellphone markets in Hyderabad near Assembly, Koti and Abids is full of shoppers who visit stores to upgrade to better cellphone. There is not even proper free space for parking. Mobile phone stores look like vegetable market these days. Many people tend to buy second hand used smartphones, which is treasure of data for hackers and attackers.
A techie, Prashant S says, “Many people don’t even bother to delete data on their cellphones while selling them off. The data is full of personal photos, videos and songs. Sometimes when display is damaged, people sell their phones for cheap. They don’t even realize that their data can be misused.”
Prashant further adds, “On Internet, nothing is free. The online app market is full of free stuff, people leach on free stuff without realizing value of their personal data and life. Lot of information is bundled as data when user installs a third party app. The ads displayed in browsers and phones is based on this user data. I would recommend to install paid apps over free ones.”
