11 Ways Your Phone Snitches On You

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Big Brother is watching. Back in the day, there was always a hood conspiracy theorist with a copy of Behold A Pale Horse talking about the Illuminati. Now there’s less paranoia because most people voluntarily give away all their info.

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Facebook founder Mark Zuckerburg wasn’t joking when he said privacy no longer exists. The biggest threat towards your info leaking isn’t your lady’s gossiping friend or a weal link in the crew. It’s in your pocket. You might want to take heed and make sure you’re not falling victim to one of these 11 ways your phone snitches on you.

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GPS Location

Before Google Maps was everywhere, your phone could triangulate your location based on cell tower positioning. Big brother has been watching, and you only make it easier when you enable your phone to broadcast your location. There’s a reason dopeboys carry burner phones.

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Bluetooth

The same radio technology that allows you to stream music in your car from your pocket and carry on a conversation during rush hour traffic can be turned against you. If you’re one of those people that keeps your Bluetooth on at all times, don’t be surprised if someone is walking around with your files after an unauthorized data transfer.

iCloud Authentication

Apple tightened up things after “The Fappening,” but putting your private data on any cloud is a dummy move. In a lot of cases, the cloud falls victim to one-pass authentication. That means one educated (or lucky) guess at your username and password combo can have the cloud raining down those naked selfies you thought were secure.

Public IG Profile

As with most things in life, some people are their own worst enemy. Posting public Instagram pics and tagging your location is a sure fire way to snitch on yourself. If you’re not a public personality whose salary is linked to being in cool places around famous people, you might want to think about switching to a private profile.

“Free” Apps

Freedom ain’t free. A silly app like a flashlight is usually free because you blindly agree to let it access all your data. Any decent smartphone comes with a built in flashlight app, or you can just use the flash from the built in camera. Don’t let some random company access your personal data for free.

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Browser Credit Card Purchases

iTunes and Google Wallet-type purchases are fairly secure. Buying products through your phones Internet browser is an entirely different story that usually ends with you having a smaller bank balance. If possible, handle your e-commerce over a more secure, standard wi-fi connection.

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Leaving Apps Open

If you insist on doing banking or other secure activity through your phone, close the application after you handle your business. All it takes is for you to leave your phone in an Uber, taxi, or on the train after doing some phone banking. Next thing you know, you’re wonder how you got stuck for your paper.

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Auto Connecting To Wi-fi

An automatic wi-fi connection sounds good in theory, since you think it’s saving your precious data plan. But an unauthorized file transfer can happen via wi-fi the same way it can via Bluetooth.

Promotional Apps

Do you know why Samsung was happy to give away a million copies of Magna Carta Holy Grail? No, not because it was mediocre. It was because most people never paid attention to the fact Samsung was asking for your GPS location, your call status and caller ID, full network access, and access to your system tools.

NFC Readers

Having an NFC chip embedded in your credit card or E-Z Pass is one thing. Having that same technology implanted in your phone—which is a telecommunication device equipped with a small computer—is not the safest option. In the wrong hands, a smartphone can read the card number, expiry date and cardholder name from your plastic just by physical contact.

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Facebook

When it comes to snitching on yourself, Facebook is public enemy number one. And even if you’re too smart to take an incriminating selfie, Facebook’s 8,700 word privacy policy allows Zuckerberg and his crew to record any information you or your friends post about you on Facebook.