With the constant ever increase phishing online it has become necessary for android users to learn how to keep their data safe and secure.
Keeping data safe and private is a key priority for Android and they have developed a number of features to keep your device secure and give you control. As part of Cybersecurity Awareness Month, These are a few of these features.
Avoiding Phishing Attacks
Phishing is when a Disguises as someone you know and tricks you into giving them your private information. Phishing can come in the form of a convincing email that looks like it’s from a company or co-worker you know, spam phone calls, and even text messages.
- Caller ID & Spam Protection: This shows you when a call you’re receiving may be coming from a suspected spammer.
- Safe Browsing: This Chrome feature lets you know if you stumble across a website know to be bad, google will help you quickly get to safety.
- Phone-as-a-Security-Key: While other forms of on-device two-factor authentication, such as SMS one-time codes and push notifications, can be phished by a remote attacker, Android’s built-in security key gives you the strongest form of Google account protection.
For Privacy Settings Controls
Many apps continue to ask for you to grant them access to several of your information, mobile devices, apps can access a lot of pertinent information such as contacts, web histories, location, photos, and more. This makes apps more useful for example, helping you navigate to the desired destination in Maps but you still want to make sure that you control who sees what.
- Permissions: Apps have to ask you for permission to access certain types of data, like your photos or contacts. To grant or revoke permission, head to Settings > Privacy, if you are using Android 10. For Android Pie and below, head to Settings > Apps & notifications > Advanced > App Permissions.
- Location permissions: You can tell an app that it may only access your location when you’re actually using that app, as opposed to “all the time” or “never.”
- Incognito mode in Google Maps: When you turn on Incognito mode in Maps, your Maps activity on that device, like the places you search for, won’t be saved to your Google Account and won’t be used to personalize your Maps experience.
Protecting your Device from bad Apps
Criminals use potentially harmful applications to steal information. Google Play Protect makes sure these applications stay off your device by automatically scanning your apps to make sure everything is safe. If you do encounter one of these bad apps, Google Play Protect will quickly alert you and instruct you on how to remove the app from your device.
Via Google Blog