Nearly one year later, any conversation about your legal rights regarding the protection of your phone's content seems almost trivial compared to the emergence of a domestic police state that disappears US citizens for days while seemingly testing constitutional boundaries instead of protecting them.
Earlier this month, NPR reported that ICE officers are taking DNA samples from protesters they've arrested, regardless of whether those people legitimately faced any charges or not. The article provides one account of a protester who was tackled and detained after allegedly doing nothing more than standing on the side of the road to film the actions of ICE officers. He was eventually released without being charged, but not before his inner cheek was swabbed for a DNA sample.
I've settled on a middle ground. My face does indeed unlock my phone, but I have it set so that if I hit the button on the right side five times in a row it brings up the power down/call...
I've settled on a middle ground. My face does indeed unlock my phone, but I have it set so that if I hit the button on the right side five times in a row it brings up the power down/call emergency/etc screen, and simply hitting "cancel" forces the phone to stop accepting my face ID until I can input a code. This is, to me, fine if I'm going out and about, and lets me keep the convenience of face ID unlocking while I'm at home. I can think of places where this wouldn't be of any use to me (sudden encounters I wasn't expecting) but for the vast majority of situations it should be fine.
The 5-press thing? Yeah, if it's not something I personally set up then it's a feature I learned about long ago and use so often that I forgot it's a basic baked-in feature.
The 5-press thing? Yeah, if it's not something I personally set up then it's a feature I learned about long ago and use so often that I forgot it's a basic baked-in feature.
Yep. It's how it works on all iPhones that have some biometric login, either touch id or face id. I believe it was made for this exact reason after Apple had some spats with law enforcement.
Yep. It's how it works on all iPhones that have some biometric login, either touch id or face id. I believe it was made for this exact reason after Apple had some spats with law enforcement.
For Androids you have to enable this but you can hold the power button and get Lockdown mode as an option - no notifications, no biometrics until you unlock again.
For Androids you have to enable this but you can hold the power button and get Lockdown mode as an option - no notifications, no biometrics until you unlock again.
I'm very similar. I don't use face ID but I do use my thumbprint which I figure would be slightly more difficult to get correct ( I certainly can't always get it right) I also have my phone set to...
I'm very similar. I don't use face ID but I do use my thumbprint which I figure would be slightly more difficult to get correct ( I certainly can't always get it right) I also have my phone set to auto lock if it is disconnected from from data and Wi-Fi entirely. Which is a thing that would happen if my phone was put into evidence. My phone stays unlocked only if connected to my car Bluetooth (or I am reading a book). And I have a red alert automation that starts recording, broadcasts to my house, and iirc locks my phone while recording. It used to text but that functionality was broken.
When I travel in June I'll be changing the settings, but for my day to day it works for me
I've gotten used to always using at least a PIN at minimum for all mobile devices, and have considered moving to a longer password. It doesn't feel inconvenient to me anymore because it's just...
I've gotten used to always using at least a PIN at minimum for all mobile devices, and have considered moving to a longer password. It doesn't feel inconvenient to me anymore because it's just habit at this point, so no annoyance is felt. I will use biometric for some things once the phone is unlocked (like downloading an app or whatever) but not for device unlocking.
Rather than try to remember random sequences of numbers for my PINs, I try to make a shape. Back when it was just 4-digit pins, I'd make simple things like the tretrominoes (the shapes from...
Rather than try to remember random sequences of numbers for my PINs, I try to make a shape. Back when it was just 4-digit pins, I'd make simple things like the tretrominoes (the shapes from Tetris, which all happen to have 4 blocks) and now that it's 6+ digits I make more interesting shapes. I treat it like a mini pixel art game.
As an aside: if iPhone offered a swipe pin code I'd use that instead. I really don't like tapping a bunch of numbers, even if I can make a fun little pattern with it. There were little tricks to the swipe code that made me able to make the phone, I felt, a little more secure because even if someone was shoulder-surfing me, they might not have noticed that, say, I swiped from the upper-right pin to the lower-left pin but skipped the middle pin because I know that it has a relatively small hitbox and I can slightly swerve around it and bypass it, but the line will still be drawn through it making it look as if I hit it. The only down side of the swipe pin was not being able to use the same pin twice.
Like the pattern to unlock that Android has? Or Swype? Or something else? I remember reading that the reason Android's pattern unlock requires a minimum of four "dots" is to make it "different...
As an aside: if iPhone offered a swipe pin code I'd use that instead.
Like the pattern to unlock that Android has? Or Swype? Or something else?
I remember reading that the reason Android's pattern unlock requires a minimum of four "dots" is to make it "different enough" from Apple's "slide to unlock" for "legal purposes". I wonder if Android has a patent on their pattern to unlock.
I do mean the dots, yeah. I used to take advantage of things like how a dot couldn't be used twice to traverse through a used dot to make the connection to another dot on the other side. So I'd...
I do mean the dots, yeah. I used to take advantage of things like how a dot couldn't be used twice to traverse through a used dot to make the connection to another dot on the other side. So I'd maybe start with the middle dot and then use that for some wild bending. I used to refer to it as "my arcane rune" for unlocking my phone. I'm a dork, what can I say?
Back before I lost my updated phone, my Android had a setting to have biometrics as an option but have it be disabled on the lock screen. So if ever I was held to a random search, they can't...
Back before I lost my updated phone, my Android had a setting to have biometrics as an option but have it be disabled on the lock screen. So if ever I was held to a random search, they can't unlock it; but when I want to make my payments quick, I can just move my thumb instead of fiddling with two separate passwords and holding up a line
So very ugh wtf :(
I've settled on a middle ground. My face does indeed unlock my phone, but I have it set so that if I hit the button on the right side five times in a row it brings up the power down/call emergency/etc screen, and simply hitting "cancel" forces the phone to stop accepting my face ID until I can input a code. This is, to me, fine if I'm going out and about, and lets me keep the convenience of face ID unlocking while I'm at home. I can think of places where this wouldn't be of any use to me (sudden encounters I wasn't expecting) but for the vast majority of situations it should be fine.
FYI for anyone reading this, this is how all iPhones are set up by default. I'm not sure if there is even a way to disable this feature.
The 5-press thing? Yeah, if it's not something I personally set up then it's a feature I learned about long ago and use so often that I forgot it's a basic baked-in feature.
Yep. It's how it works on all iPhones that have some biometric login, either touch id or face id. I believe it was made for this exact reason after Apple had some spats with law enforcement.
For Androids you have to enable this but you can hold the power button and get Lockdown mode as an option - no notifications, no biometrics until you unlock again.
Nice. There are still some thoughtful people running around the Cupertino campus, it seems.
I'm very similar. I don't use face ID but I do use my thumbprint which I figure would be slightly more difficult to get correct ( I certainly can't always get it right) I also have my phone set to auto lock if it is disconnected from from data and Wi-Fi entirely. Which is a thing that would happen if my phone was put into evidence. My phone stays unlocked only if connected to my car Bluetooth (or I am reading a book). And I have a red alert automation that starts recording, broadcasts to my house, and iirc locks my phone while recording. It used to text but that functionality was broken.
When I travel in June I'll be changing the settings, but for my day to day it works for me
I've gotten used to always using at least a PIN at minimum for all mobile devices, and have considered moving to a longer password. It doesn't feel inconvenient to me anymore because it's just habit at this point, so no annoyance is felt. I will use biometric for some things once the phone is unlocked (like downloading an app or whatever) but not for device unlocking.
Rather than try to remember random sequences of numbers for my PINs, I try to make a shape. Back when it was just 4-digit pins, I'd make simple things like the tretrominoes (the shapes from Tetris, which all happen to have 4 blocks) and now that it's 6+ digits I make more interesting shapes. I treat it like a mini pixel art game.
As an aside: if iPhone offered a swipe pin code I'd use that instead. I really don't like tapping a bunch of numbers, even if I can make a fun little pattern with it. There were little tricks to the swipe code that made me able to make the phone, I felt, a little more secure because even if someone was shoulder-surfing me, they might not have noticed that, say, I swiped from the upper-right pin to the lower-left pin but skipped the middle pin because I know that it has a relatively small hitbox and I can slightly swerve around it and bypass it, but the line will still be drawn through it making it look as if I hit it. The only down side of the swipe pin was not being able to use the same pin twice.
Like the pattern to unlock that Android has? Or Swype? Or something else?
I remember reading that the reason Android's pattern unlock requires a minimum of four "dots" is to make it "different enough" from Apple's "slide to unlock" for "legal purposes". I wonder if Android has a patent on their pattern to unlock.
I do mean the dots, yeah. I used to take advantage of things like how a dot couldn't be used twice to traverse through a used dot to make the connection to another dot on the other side. So I'd maybe start with the middle dot and then use that for some wild bending. I used to refer to it as "my arcane rune" for unlocking my phone. I'm a dork, what can I say?
You know things are bad when Philip DeFranco is literally recommending that US travellers only bring burner devices on entry.
For Pixel users, would back up --> wipe --> cross border --> restore be a sufficiently secure strategy?
This was something I was wondering about as well, but as an iPhone user.
That's been my plan for years in the case that I should ever have to travel across the US border again.
Back before I lost my updated phone, my Android had a setting to have biometrics as an option but have it be disabled on the lock screen. So if ever I was held to a random search, they can't unlock it; but when I want to make my payments quick, I can just move my thumb instead of fiddling with two separate passwords and holding up a line