With a wide range of smartphones available in the market, the number of smartphone users is also rising. However, those dealing in smartphones stress that before selling their smartphones, the users should ensure that they have deleted all personal information — a measure which many smartphone users fail to take before selling their smartphones.
Smartphone users generally store the bank account passwords, personal email and private photographs among other items that could be exploited on falling into the wrong hands.According to a mobile phone shop owner Sonu Gupta, "The number of smartphones sold to me without personal information being deleted is umpteen.
The data on one such smartphone were not completely deleted with call data still on it. Some of your information, however anonymous, will remain on the phone even if you perform a proper factory reset.Another phone we bought from a company that claimed to specialise in cell phone recycling arrived with contact information, voicemail, and text messages on it. One guy asked me to log him out of the e-mail if he was still logged in to it on the smartphone I had purchased."
College student Sakshi Sharma who had purchased a second-hand smartphone said that the day when she purchased it, the previous owner's personal contacts and e-mail account were accessible. She then went to a mobile phone shop where she got the phone formatted securely.Meanwhile, Gupta advised, "Backing up your data and then following the manufacturer's directions for restoring the smartphone's factory settings apart from running an anti-virus programme is important.
The pictures you need should be saved on the memory card and on your computer or an online backup service or clouding service, for easy transfer. For example, Apple provides information on how to back up your iPhone using iCloud or on your computer using iTunes. Don't forget to remove your storage device because it also contains your data files, before selling the phone," he added.