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RESETTING YOUR PHONE, or making sure it’s encrypted may not be enough to prevent your personal data from being retrieved if it’s lost or stolen, according to new research.
The findings, from the forensics team from Deloitte, found that even when a phone or tablet has been reset, both personal and corporate data could be retrieved from it. Such information could include mobile payment details, emails addresses, contact lists and PPS numbers.
The researchers tested out two scenarios. The first was a simulation of lost or stolen devices and the second was a set of second-hand phones that had been wiped. Mobile devices from Apple, Blackberry, Android, Windows Phone and a number of tablets were tested.
For the first scenario, 50 per cent of the mobile devices were encrypted and 90 per cent were password locked, while for the second scenario, 40 per cent of mobile devices were encrypted.
Under the first scenario, where the phones were stolen, the researchers successfully recovered the owners’ email addresses in 90 per cent of cases. In 75 per cent of cases, it was possible to identify the owner and recover their contacts, while passwords were recovered in 40 per cent of cases.
For 25 per cent of cases, PPS numbers could be identified as they were stored in contacts or SMS messages.
In the second scenario, which involved factory wiped phones, it found that it was possible to access text and chat logs in 85 per cent of cases, while the original owner was identifiable in 70 per cent of cases.
In 60 per cent of cases, it was possible to retrieve contacts and identify the owners’ email addresses. Researchers were able to recover passwords in 30 per cent of cases while PPS numbers were recovered in 15 per cent of cases.
According to Deloitte, the research was to determine what data was retrievable from both first and second-hand phones.
The organisation recommended a number of practices to help protect personal and corporate data in the case of theft or moving to a new device such as encrypting your device, evaluating apps carefully before downloading them, giving it a passcode, and recording the IMEI number on the device which can be used by your service provider to deactivate your phone.
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What about browsing history :)
Wink wink
You spelled it wrong, Ben.
Would be interesting to see little more detailed breakdown of devices vs encryption vs password-protected bit, because all iOS devices with passcode are encrypted…
Is this the end of upgrade trade-ins?
Technical question .. How do you securely wipe a phone before passing it on to a new person, if a factory reset doesn’t work?
You need to properly erase the flash memory. Preferably with multiple overwrites. Blancco have an offering which will achieve this.
Hope that helps
You can usually do it on android phones by holding down volume and powering on. Should be an option to wipe or erase and factory reset. Just Google it for your phone type
Now, question, why would you be holding PPS numbers on your device?
What use is my pps to someone else?
Important question. What encryption was tested?
Though alternative research has found that a Can of petrol and a match will protect your data just fine!
That really is the only absolute way. I never sell old phones. I have a mighty collection :)
For hard drives use a screwdriver and hammer, for phones sure just melt them, it’s the only safe way. Want to see something scary on a laptop or computer go into search and type .jpg and click go.
Old news….
Hope Gary Glitter isn’t reading this article…
Couldn’t find the % key ?
What’s new there?
People can take more care with their passwords and data – hence – http://www.facecrypt.com
I know a man that bought a refurbished phone and the day after he got it the police came knocking on his door saying his phone IP address had been discovered in a child porn sting. He had to prove it had not been his phone then but still it scared the crap out of him. If you don’t have record of when your purchased the phone apparently you can be in lots of trouble.
It is what the FBI have been doing for a long time. They should be here investigating the Banks, Ian Bailey case, Cowen, and the Garda Inquiry.
Clever guys are these Accountants at Delloite’s, could be headhunted by Nokia, Samsung or Motorola!
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