How to protect your privacy on a smartphone

[saobi]

I'm sure many of you had this scenario before, you are at work, you put your phone your desk. and your friends/coworkers come over to chat, and casually pick up your phone to play around. If you don't put a unlock pattern, your gmail, sms, facebook, is completely exposed to their eyes. I've had times where coworkers picked up my phone and pulled up porn search histories on my browser, etc. In this case, should I just grab the phone back immediately from their hands whenever someone is trying to play with it, but doing this is just telling people "i have something to hide"

If you put a lock pattern, people will say "oooohhh! What do you have to hide?!", and that's even worse.

Nowadays, everytime I go to work or go out with friends , I always clear out my histories from every app. But I'm afraid I'll forget once and my social reputation will be ruined.

 

[Martin030908]

It's your device. I never understood the "What are you hiding?" hulla-ba-loo. (unless it's the wife/gf )

Should you want to keep things private that's your choice.

 

[saobi]

It's your device. I never understood the "What are you hiding?" hulla-ba-loo. (unless it's the wife/gf )

Should you want to keep things private that's your choice.

Ok, let's say it's your wife and girlfriend then? Do you guys always "disinfect" your phone everytime you go home?

 

[Martin030908]

You can set to have your browsing history not saved on the device. So that will eliminate that issue.

I don't have anything to hide :icon_ devil:

I can't think of it right now, but there are apps to password protect other apps.

 

[iPirate]

I use pattern lock.

If your gf asks just say people at work are noisy and then unlock it for her or give her the pattern to unlock it...

If you don't want her to see stuff then delete it.

 

[TheOldFart]

If you are in a committed relationship, either married or with a girlfriend, then you should not be hiding things from them. They should accept your porn usage or talking with friends of the opposite sex, as you should do for them. I don't search for porn on my Droid, but I have a lot on my computer. My wife knows exactly what I have and can see any of my discussions with female friends on facebook and sometimes talks to them too. It was the same before we got married, except that was before computers and things like facebook. As far as others, like friends or workers, it is none of their business what you look at or who you talk to. Just tell them that. If they can't handle it then you don't need them as friends.

Use the lock code and let your girlfriend have it if the relationship is a strong one and a committed one.

 

[erikfig]

It's your device. I never understood the "What are you hiding?" hulla-ba-loo. (unless it's the wife/gf )

Should you want to keep things private that's your choice.

Ok, let's say it's your wife and girlfriend then? Do you guys always "disinfect" your phone everytime you go home?

LOL!! I always desifect mine!!!

 

[JoeeDB]

This is exactly the reason why i got the app "app safe". You can choose which apps you want to password protect & it's easy to turn on/off so if you're just going to be by yourself you don't have to enter a password everytime you get a text. So now if someone wants to see my phone I'll let them see it since I have my personal stuff locked (texts, email, etc.).

 

[Benton]

"Disinfect the phone", I love the phrase. I personally make a habit of clearing the history and cache from time to time to prevent large amounts of stored or even on-board memory from being taken away. I use Dolphin HD most of the time for browsing and on EXIT (not just hitting HOME), it asks if I want to clear the History and Cache which I almost always select to do.

 

[JCo352]

As far as co-workers go, they probably look at porn too, but thats not the point. I would tell them "get up out my phone" lol. And girlfriends or wives, they really have no business in your phone either, if they don't trust you, then it's not a good relationship anyway. They way I feel about it, my pockets, are my pockets, people can keep their hands out of 'em, same goes for my phone.

 

[kodiak799]

Well, the simple solution is run two home launchers, one for the office (with potentially embarassing information shown in apps/widgets not added to the homescreen) and then a personal one for out of the office. You could even set your Droid to switch automatically with a program Locale.

Alternatively, if you go with Sweeterhome, you can create hidden buttons that would take you to "screens" with the apps/widgets you want to keep from prying eyes. I have 14+ screens and if I wanted to add a hidden button to one of them to go to another screen someone would be unlikely to discover from casually playing with my phone.

Also, look into Cachemate. It can be set to clear a variety of caches (don't know about browser search history, but it does market search history as well) as frequently as every hour.

 

[RETG]

No one seems to want to grab my personal phone, then again it is on my belt next to two .40 caliber, 14-round, magazines.dancedroid

 

[Fault]

My girl knows my lock pattern, but I never 'set down my phone' its ALWAYS in my pocket, or in my hand. My girl also always uses the FB app, but i have nothing to hide. If u use dolphin broswer, u have the option to delete history