WASHINGTON, Aug. 30, 2006
Betrayed By A Cell Phone
Don't Keep Secrets On Your Cell Phone — It Might Not Keep Them
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Play CBS Video Video Protecting Personal Records A lot of data remains in cell phones, even after they are erased. Nick Magliato of Trust Digital, a tech security company, talks with Hannah Storm about what you should do before changing phones.
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(AP)
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"So," she wrote, "I'll talk to u next week."
"You want a break from me? Then fine," he wrote back.
Later, the married man bought a new phone. He sold his old one on eBay, at Internet auction, for $290.
The guys who bought it now know his secret.
The married man had followed the directions in his phone's manual to erase all his information, including lurid exchanges with his lover. But it wasn't enough.
Selling your old phone once you upgrade to a fancier model can be like handing over your diaries. All sorts of sensitive information pile up inside our cell phones, and deleting it may be more difficult than you think.
A popular practice among sellers, resetting the phone, often means sensitive information appears to have been erased. But it can be resurrected using specialized yet inexpensive software found on the Internet.
A company, Trust Digital of McLean, Va., bought 10 different phones on eBay this summer to test phone-security tools it sells for businesses. The phones all were fairly sophisticated models capable of working with corporate e-mail systems.
Curious software experts at Trust Digital resurrected information on nearly all the used phones, including the racy exchanges between guarded lovers.
The other phones contained:
The recovered information was equal to 27,000 pages — a stack of printouts eight feet high.
"We found just a mountain of personal and corporate data," said Nick Magliato, Trust Digital's chief executive.
Magliato discussed protecting personal data on cell phones with co-anchor Hannah Storm on The Early Show Thursday. To see the interview, click here.
Many of the phones were owned personally by the sellers but crammed with sensitive corporate information, underscoring the blurring of work and home. "They don't come with a warning label that says, 'Be careful.' The data on these phones is very important," Magliato said.
CBS News technology consultant Larry Magid reports this is a common problem for all sorts of electronics that have a memory. There are cases of people recovering data from computer hard drives found in landfills. Whether with cell phones, computer hard disks or personal digitals assistants, Magid likens just hitting delete to crumpling up a piece of paper and throwing it in a trash can rather than shredding it.
©MMVI, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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- Never having been a slave to technology, I can manage both cell phone use and expense, so that it does not overtake my common sense and decorum. That a cell phone has a diary capacity when reused is a no brainer, so I am neither surprised nor empathising with anyone who has such a scenario play out. It is like using a computer then not wanting your job to ever know what you had on it. I have seen what should be highly confidential material on donated and recycled electronics. On the up side, that a cell phone can be perpetually used to dial "911", even if service is off, is great for one in distress. Also, the advent of towers and satellites improved the capability of specifically locating the orign and contents of calls, like DNA, to solve crimes. No more stealthy bosses can forward calls from the job to their homes while we toiled on site while they could give the higher ups the impression that they were at work too. On a darker note, a corrupt New Orleans ex-policeman and his triggerman were convicted of arranging the murder of a mother that had reported his public beating of a young man needlessly to internal affairs.
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- I totally agree! I work at a pharmacy and the people are so rude with their cell phones that we had to put up a sign to tell them not to talk on their phone while picking up their script. They still get upset when you ask them to get off. My wife and I do not own cell phones and live just fine.
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- i know i'll be in the minority - but my opinion on this article is GOOD! these *&%$ cell phones are taking over our lives - young and old are cell-phone crazy. i have one, but use it as i believe it should be - IN AN EMERGENCY!!! and please, please pray that a law is passed that NO ONE can use while driving. one can always pull over to make a call, whether it be for pleasure or an emergency.
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