Have you considered the danger of selling or giving out your old phones? Even if you reset to factory settings or flash it, your data can be still be easily recovered.

How it is done

With a computer and the right programs which are gotten free of charge online, all a person needs to do is connect the phone and scan it with the program and then view and save the data of interest.

This might not work 100%, but a whole lot of data could be recovered.

The danger

Think of the messages you have sent, some of which might contain confidential information like passwords. Think of those sexchats and sex texts. Think of those nude pictures you exchanged with your lovers or concubines. Scary right? Scarier that the programs needed to recover such information are available in public domain and are mostly free of charge.

A scammer might use them. A person might blackmail you with your past. Your marriage or relationship might crash just because you disposed your old phones. Your past might really hunt you so you need to be careful. Is the situation completely helpless? No

What you can do

In the past, factory reset was enough to keep you safe if you disposed your phone. Sadly it's no more. Before you dispose your phone now, encrypt it.

Go to your phone's setting>security>phone encryption. Please make sure that your battery is 100% charged and that the phone is plugged into a power supply while the encryption takes place. It will take about an hour to complete, all things being equal.

Reset to factory settings after the encryption. Then you're free to sell. When the phone is encrypted, it will be near impossible to view information gleaned from it via recovery.

Never forget, encrypt your phone before you can sell it to avoid stories that touch. Better be safe than sorry.

What do you think. Do you feel you should be concerned about the phones you have disposed wrongly in the past?

TheRealProphet:
Every sane human being format his/her phone before selling it...but to the insane and uneducated ones I think this post is for you


Well, imes is coming sha...The end of days. We hope that he'll be coming to clarify the truth about life; the truth of which is hidden to many people.

imes, we await your coming.

uncleck:
the post said that formatting too isn't full proof

TheRealProphet:
Every sane human being format his/her phone before selling it...but to the insane and uneducated ones I think this post is for you


Well, imes is coming sha...The end of days. We hope that he'll be coming to clarify the truth about life; the truth of which is hidden to many people.

imes, we await your coming.

uncleck:
the post said that formatting too isn't full proof

TheRealProphet:
Every sane human being format his/her phone before selling it...but to the insane and uneducated ones I think this post is for you


Well, imes is coming sha...The end of days. We hope that he'll be coming to clarify the truth about life; the truth of which is hidden to many people.

imes, we await your coming.