Wipe Data From Your Phone Image

How to Wipe Data From Your Phone Before Selling It

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Do you want to sell your old smartphone? If yes, do you know how to delete phone data? Knowing how to wipe data from phone completely prevents sensitive information from falling into the hands of others. Erasing data is simpler than you might think.

In a recent study, security company Avast said it was able to retrieve images and contacts from smartphones sold over the internet. According to the company, users did not take the necessary precautions to delete the information.

So, what is the correct way to delete data from your mobile? In this post, we guide you on how to wipe data from your phone before selling it. Read on

How To Wipe Mobile Data: microSD Card

The first part to be erased must be the microSD card. Always start by backing up the information on the card, whether using a cloud storage service (Google Photos, Google Drive, OneDrive, Dropbox, etc.) or removing the microSD card and transferring the files to a computer with an adapter.

Remember that to remove the MicroSD safely, it is necessary to turn off the cell phone. There are two ways to clean the microSD card:

  1. By phone: go to settings -> storage. Touch SD card and touch delete. Confirm by entering your password or unlock code to confirm
  2. By computer: if you connected your SD to the computer, open the “My Computer” menu or the drive corresponding to your SD in the operating system. Right-click and choose the “format” option. Select the option “complete formatting” and click and “OK” on the confirmation screen to delete the data.

Deleting data from your microSD card will prevent your information from being used by other people, and may cause personal harm to you or your family.

Backup Phone Data Before Erasing Everything

Ensure that your information is up to date before you wipe the data on your phone. That means logging into Google/Gmail or iCloud/iTunes and checking that your contacts, calendar, and sensitive information are all there. To back up your data, you can do the following.

  • On Android: open settings -> backup and reset. Enable the option to back up my data. Then, tap back and go to the accounts option in the settings. Go to your Google account. Touch it and make sure that all services are synchronized. The same procedure for accounts (tapping the account and checking the sync) must be performed for other apps that need sync.
  • On IOS: go to settings and tap iCloud. Touch backup and activate the service. Touch back up now.

How To Reset Phone Data

If you have hurried down here, go back to the beginning and read it all over again. What nobody wants is to delete files and then forget that they didn’t back up important information.

Take it easy on that nervous finger to erase your data. Only the microSD card is safer to erase, and even then, you saw that we did the backup before. So now, get to work.

How To Wipe Data On IOS

Well, first, let’s understand how this process works on Apple devices. As the company takes care of the hardware and software, the procedure for eliminating content is very effective and fast.

From the iPhone 3GS onwards, Apple incorporated data encryption directly through the hardware. This means that all data on your iPhone (iPad or iPod) is recorded with a key that guarantees maximum security, which ensures that only your device recognizes the files.

When formatting the device, in addition to completely deleting the data, iOS deletes the key that gave access to the information. In practice, this means that even using advanced methods to recover data, there is no way to recover anything that was on the device.

First of all, check if your contacts are stored on the SIM, as this procedure will erase any number that is saved in your device’s memory. Here’s how you can delete all of your information:

  1. Open your device’s “Settings.”
  2. Navigate until you find the “General” option
  3. Scroll through the list and open the item “Reset.”
  4. Click on “Delete All Content and Settings”
  5. A confirmation message will be displayed. Just click on “Delete iPhone” (the message changes depending on the phone) and wait.

Now, all settings have returned to their factory defaults, and your personal documents have been deleted.

How To Wipe Data On An Android Device

Unlike iOS, mainly due to the huge variety of devices, Android does not have native data encryption. This means that the system, in its default state, is a little less secure – which is not to say that it cannot be as secure as the competitor with a simple configuration.

To lock all your data and ensure greater privacy, Android offers encryption in the security settings. After performing this procedure, Android will request a password (not the SIM PIN) every time you turn on the device. It is also worth noting that there may be a small and almost imperceptible drop in the performance of the system.

The procedure to increase the safety of the device takes a few minutes to complete, so be patient. Here’s how to proceed:

  1. Go to the Android settings and click on “Security.”
  2. Scroll through the items until you find the option “Encrypt phone.”
  3. A screen with all the explanations about the procedure is shown. After reading the instructions, click on “Encrypt phone.”

Well, now that your personal data is linked exclusively to your device, we can perform the factory reset. Again, we fall into the old problem of differences between devices from each manufacturer, but the process must be very simple and similar to what we show here:

  1. In the settings, click on “General management.”
  2. Click the Reset option
  3. Click Factory data reset – to reset the phone to it’s original ‘New’ status.

Now, all of your information has been deleted from your Android phone.

Conclusion

At this point, your mobile should be ready to change hands without you having to worry about whether the other person will be able to access your data. All your data will be erased and well erased.