CBS 4 investigator Al Sunshine and McAfee expert Robert Siciliano tested 30 used phones from eBay and Craigslist. Even after sellers wiped them, the phones still contained photos, documents, and account information. Siciliano recommends factory resets, removing SIM and SD cards, or destroying the device before reselling.
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Phone numbers, passwords, bank account information. We all know how to put that stuff on our smartphones, but do you know how to get it off for good? Even if you think you've wiped your phone clean before you get rid of it, it may not be enough. CBS 4 chief consumer investigator Al Sunshine explains why.
For many of us, they become as much of a part of our lives as the food we eat.
It's pretty critical. Basically, my whole life is on this phone.
Life's critical details. I'm not checking account. Provides me with a connection. In fact, with memory sizes growing, smartphones today can carry as much of our personal information as we store on a laptop or home computer. All the contacts, all my phone numbers, my Facebook is all on there. Just some of the personal kind of data McAfee cybersecurity expert Robert Siciliano was looking into when he went online, scrolled through the vast smartphone offerings on eBay and Craigslist, and bought 30 used devices.
I bought Androids, iPhones and BlackBerrys, and I did this with McAfee, McAfee Antivirus, and we found people's entire digital lives.
Now before Robert tells you what he found, you need to understand his cyber technician was not using any fancy CIA-specialized scanning software.
He just used regular tools that were available off the internet to look for this data, you know, on these devices. And he found everything.
Everything? As in?
People left all their information there. PDFs, Word documents, text files, Excel files, home videos, photos, and a lot of pornography, actually. Enough information to either steal their identities or take over existing identities.
And that was despite the best efforts of those selling the phones to wipe them clean. Make sure I take the SIM card out. Removing the SIM card and the SD card from the phone is vital. Both are critical storage areas, but They aren't the only virtual file drawers in smartphones.
The devices themselves generally have their own, uh, storage.
The cell phone manufacturers will tell you to go to your settings menu and restore factory settings to clear your personal information, which Siciliano says works pretty well with BlackBerrys and iPhones.
But with the Android phones, the Motorola Droid specifically, Even when a factory reset was done, we still found data.
Enough data to easily pull off an identity theft. Siciliano says while you might be okay cashing in on your BlackBerry or iPhone, based on what his investigation found, he won't be your competition.
I will never, ever sell or let go any secondhand device on eBay or Craigslist. I won't donate it. I'll take that mobile phone, I'll destroy it.
If you insist on selling your old phones, Siciliano says BlackBerrys and iPhones should be reset to factory settings at least twice, if not 3 or 4 times. He advises against reselling Android phones, but adds, if you do, hit the factory reset 10 or 12 times and hope for the best. I'm Al Sunshine, CBS 4 News.
