Help File/data security

[sir blobbeth]

Honor 10 lite - Android 9

Dear all, I am concerned about data security if I lose my phone.

Is it true that all Android phones now encrypt the data that you store by default ?
If so is it fair to say no one could recover data from my phone unless they could log in like I do ? ( Pattern Grid thing )

And as a follow up question. Is there an app to overwrite the free space in which the deleted files exist ? IE Bleachbit for Android.

cheers

 

[Hadron]

Yes, the internal storage of the phone will be encrypted (removable sd card will not be unless you have chosen to encrypt it).

As long as you've not made any modifications to the system software (e.g. unlocked the bootloader, installed a custom recovery) there should be no way to access the data without unlocking the phone. I mention those modifications because you can use ADB from a custom recovery - however I've not done this with a phone with encrypted storage, so don't know whether there would now be some further protection on that.

Just doing a factory reset should suffice to protect the data, which, if the phone is switched on and in contact with the network, you can do remotely using Google's Find My Device app if you enable it in advance. The reset will wipe the encryption key as well as the data, so there will be no way of recovering the data. And in addition this will trigger factory reset protection, which will lock them out of the phone completely unless they know your google login and password.