The smartphone is today's world most demanding technology even more demanding than PC. Today a single smartphone can do almost all your tasks just by a single touch or by your voice command, it can automate your office works, it manages your schedules, order your daily need, it can show the shortest travel path, financial transaction, video calls and many more.
Due to the increase in cool features of a smartphone, it's consumptions also increased as well, hence more consumption more user data is generated by a smartphone and the more chances of a smartphone to get hacked. Hence it's your responsibility to make sure that like your laptop your smartphone also should be secure.
So, here I bring you 10 ways to make your smartphone more secure.
- Use two-factor authentication
- Download apps only from google app store/apple app store
- Use a virtual private network(VPN)
- Use a secure password managing system
- Use a safe web browser
- Turn off the connections when you don't need them
- Use smart lock
- Use find my device feature
- Use the emergency contact info
- Check all app permissions
1. Use two-factor authentication
With the increase in websites and mobile apps, the number of user accounts and its password increases which attracts malicious attackers. Hence two-factor authentication adds an additional layer of protection to your user account.
It is also called two-step verification process where the user provides two different authentication factors to verify themselves.
Firstly a user will log in using the user id and password and instead of getting all-access immediately the user needs to provide another piece of information to get the access this piece of information is called authentication factors.
These authentication factors are:
- Something that user knows PIN numbers, passwords etc.
- Something that user has an ID card, smartphone, a security token etc.
- Something the user is like a fingerprint, iris scan, voice pattern etc.
2. Download mobile app only from google play store or apple app store
The majority of the malware enters into smartphones from an unreliable third party application sources.
This third-party unreliable application generates confidential data from your smartphones which can be used for malicious activities. Hence always download mobile apps from trusted sources.
Google already kept working on to make google play store safer than ever, it uses google play protect to scan your Android device for malware while installing the app.
But makes sure the feature is active on your smartphone.
3. Use virtual private network(VPN)
Everybody likes to use free internet access, in public places like airport, cafe, railway etc, especially when we are waiting for our flights. But most of the people don't know that connecting to this free wifi without thinking is it secure out they put their devices and data in great danger.
Most of the malicious attackers provide these free internet access on public places to capture their victims and extract the confidential data from their connected devices.
Hence it's a good practice to use a VPN while connecting to an unknown wifi network.
VPN is a service that allows you to connect to the internet via an encrypted tunnel to protect your online privacy and sensitive data.
VPN is used for a secure connection on public wifi and hotspot, it also hides your IP address and makes your browsing private.
4. Use a secure password management system
Nowadays we use tons of social networking websites, apps, emails, shopping accounts etc, that's why nowadays we all have tons of complex passwords to remember which is impossible. Writing down all password on a piece of paper is also not a good practise as it will reveal all your privacy if somebody finds out that paper.
Hence it's a good practice to use a secure password management system because instead of remembering all password we just need to focus only on one password.
But before choosing any password manager make sure it's a secure one because it is a prime target for most of the attackers.
5. Use a safe web browser
Whenever we want to search for anything on the internet we go to the web browser for surfing. There are many malicious web browsers available on the internet which will offer you some coins or coupons for internet surfing, but what they do they extract your data and do business for your data. This type of browser will not even warn you for any untrusted website or to download any dangerous files.
Hence always use a trusted web browser for net surfing. In the case of android, chrome is the default web browser. If you are using google chrome you can rest a little in this case because the chrome using the safe browsing mode by default to browse the internet, therefore it will show the warnings in case of untrusted websites.
6. Turn off the connections when you don't need them
Along with the smartphones we use many devices such as Bluetooth, headset, speakers which require Bluetooth connection or wifi connection to transfer data. But most people forget to turn off the Bluetooth after the usage which provides a wide to our smartphone security system. Hence it's a good practice to turn off the Bluetooth after the usage.
On the internet, there are many files transferring mobile apps available which not access your data files but also extracts them. Hence always download trusted file transferring apps from google play store.
7. Use a smart lock
On the android device, there is a security feature called smart lock, this smart lock feature provides flexibility and automates to our device security system and let us relax a bit. This smart lock feature provides an option on what location our device is allowed to stay unlocked and the rest of the place it will stay locked until it requires.
But one thing you must keep in mind before enabling this feature that only you should know the location where the smartphone can stay unlocked.
8. Use find my device feature
Whether you simply misplace your phone, lost or stolen every android device have its built-in features to ring, find or even erase the data from far apart. With this feature, you can find where your device is.
Hence make sure this feature is activated on your device. For this just go to the setting option and search to find my device option and enable it.
9. Use the emergency contact info
Find my device is a cool feature but you can get your missing phone faster if you give a chance to the people to help you.
This emergency contact info feature provides an option to give phone number of your trusted one as an emergency contact. So whenever your phone gets lost and found by any fellow person, the phone will display a message like "swipe up to return back the phone to the phone owner", and when the fellow person swipes up your trusted person will receive a phone call to contact to the fellow person.
10. App permissions
No app is able to access the data of your phone unless you give permission to that app. While installing the app some apps ask for permission and some apps by default access the device data.
Hence you should keep an eye on these apps for which app is accessing which type of data, especially in case of photos, camera and your location. To disable the permission of any app simply go to the setting option and go to the app manager and then select the app to see and disable the permission.
But it's a good practice to uninstall the untrusted or unused apps.
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