Transcription
This is the biggest threat to your privacy. If somebody's trying to hack you, surveil you, or use your data against you, you'll need different types of security. I've spent years learning the best high-tech tools and techniques to take back control. This is how to protect your phone in every situation you find yourself in.
From the everyday essentials to an unexpected arrest, there are four states of threat to your phone security. One, everyday life. Two, risky places. Three, when someone is spying on you. And four, when you've been physically detained.
Stage one, what are the essentials for phone security for every person on Earth? Firstly, ensure that you've installed all updates. An operating system is more secure if it has the latest security updates. Protect your accounts with long and secure passwords. One way of coming up with these is to look at three things on the street and combine them together, such as car, building, window. Back up your devices. This ensures against data loss, but also means that you can wipe them quickly in the event of an emergency. Turn off message previews. These allow anybody looking over your shoulder to see that text message from a friend, your mom or dad. Remove apps that are associated with data brokers from your phone. Three of the worst offenders here are PayPal, Snapchat, and apps which come from Google. Download secure options for messengers, mail, and other communication devices. And crucially, get your social circle using them. If you can, use an alternative operating system for your phone. On mine here, I have Graphene OS, which is a very, very hardened operating system that is extremely resilient to individuals trying to get into it. Finally, the cloud is just someone else's computer, and you need to be very, very mindful of that when it comes to sending files there.
In some countries, at airports, in the middle of protests, or at border crossings, you should think of your phone as a tracking device. Authorities can collect device identifiers, log your location. Fake cell towers can intercept traffic. Suddenly, your metadata becomes evidence.
This is how to prepare your phone for high-risk environments. Firstly, turn off voice assistant. This is something which can be used to make your device do things that you don't want it to do. Enable some kind of autolock, meaning that once your device has been unlocked and untouched for a certain period of time, it will turn itself off. Turn off biometrics, as you can be forced to unlock your phone in certain situations using these. Or if you have to use them, use a strange finger rather than your normal index in order to unlock a device. Many devices will have something called lockdown mode, which allows you to quickly disable biometrics in the event of an emergency. Use disappearing messages. This will mean that anything that you send or receive will only stay on your phone for a short period of time. Use a black background for your phone. A picture of a loved one, a pet, or even worse, yourself can easily be linked back to you. Turn off location services, Bluetooth, and Wi-Fi. All three of these things are constantly pinging and working against you. If you want to stay private, download offline maps, ensuring that you can navigate around in the event that you can't use the internet. Log out of any non-essential accounts because you never know which one of these is snitching on you.
When you're being spied on, basic privacy tools stop being enough. If you're a dissident or a journalist in a dangerous country, or if someone is trying to hack, dox, or stalk you. In this nightmare situation, you have to presume that you're being surveilled at all times. Suddenly, typing a password on your phone is no longer safe. You need a new approach. Consider a burner device. This is a phone that you would happily discard when you have to and turn off your phone when it is not needed. For all of the other times that it is needed, put it into airplane mode, switching it off of airplane mode only when you need to access things like Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, or your messages. For bonus points, carry around a Faraday bag. This is a physical piece of kit that you can use to block signals and consider setting up what's called a duress pin. This is a different pin to your normal login, which if entered into your phone will instantly wipe it. One of the things that you can do with this duress pin is carry it on your person somewhere like your wallet. So, if you were to be detained and someone was to take that pin and put it into your phone, it would wipe all of the contents. And remember that rebooting your device puts it into what's called BFU, before first unlock mode, which means it's much harder to get into.
This is the worst-case scenario. It could be criminals, cops, or military, but bad actors have grabbed you. At this point, everything becomes fair game unless you prepared. Input that duress pin and wipe the data from your device, knowing that later on you'll be able to restore from a backup. Make sure that you know your rights. In the US, you cannot be compelled to hand over your password, but in the UK, India, and France, you can be. In the US, that does not apply to biometrics. So, act accordingly. Knowing your location in the event of an arrest is essential, as not only will you need to relay this to other people, but also your legal rights will change depending upon where you are. And above all else, shut up.