Minu: Smartphone may cause Data Leak

 

It’s about 7:30 in the evening; I shut down the laptop and got up giving necessary instructions to my office assistant to close the office. As I was about to leave, my mobile phone rang. 

"Hello Aunty!! Minu here…" Minu’s voice seemed to be upset from beyond. "What happened?" I asked with a little bit worry.  Minu is my friend's beautiful, clever daughter and my student too. Two months ago, her marriage was fixed. "I want to meet you right now, where are you?" She asked anxiously.  “Come immediately, I'm still in the office." I replied and disconnected the phone and asked my office assistant to go. 15 minutes later, Minu was sitting in front of me. Her eyes were red. It seemed that she kept crying for a long time. She was still filling her eyes. I offered her water to drink and let her calm down then asked,
"Minu…What’s the matter?"  In response, she held her mobile phone in front of me and opened a site on it and showed me some offensive photographs, "Look, how much of my filthy photos have been uploaded on this site." She started crying again. I could not believe my eyes. I kept the mobile away from her hand, got up from my chair and went to her. With my hand resting on her back, I asked her to stay calm.

  
After some time Minu started talking to me, "My closed friend forwarded the link of these photos to me, so that I could aware of the same. Her husband saw these photos on a porn site. I was shocked to see these photos. How’s it possible?” I was stunned and thinking that in which words I should comfort her?  In a short time, I recovered myself up.  

"Listen! Nothing will be done by weeping. Let’s think How to deal with this problem. Will you keep calm and think?" "How can I stay calm? What if my would-be husband and in-laws would aware of this?" Minu’s doubts were right. I needed to make a move and do lot of things without spending too much time. I switched on laptop. Using the link sent by her friend, I went to that site and carefully reviewed her photos. In these photos, Minu’s face was seen but the rest of body is of another girl as a tattoo drawn on her back and upper hand. I emailed request to the site to immediately remove those photos. It was necessary that all these events to be known to her husband. Instead of knowing from other sources,
I decided to call him. I made a call to Minu’s would-be husband and told him the details about what happened. He seemed to be a very sensible guy. He did not have any problem with Minu. On the contrary, He requested me to take care that she should not be upset too much. I decided to go to cyber cell next day to report the complaint. Since the face in the photo matches some of her photos in the mobile phone, I decided to check out her mobile phone.

First of all I opened the mobile settings to see what apps are installed. I found many make-up and health-related apps there. I tested the permissions of each app. One of these apps has been given all the permissions. When you install an app on a Smartphone, a screen comes informing you about how your phone is going to be used. On that screen you have to click OK or Cancel. Most of the people do not think so much.  I found that particular app had all access permissions like camera, storage, media files, etc. Therefore, the photographs through this app were uploaded to somewhere, and their morphing (mixing with another photo) was done.

I uninstalled the unnecessary and kept only some required apps on her Smartphone. The next day, we reported proper complaint to cyber cell. It is still under investigation. Today, Minu has been married for six months and she is living happily.

Friends, I am sharing this true story with Minu’s consent. The purpose is to keep your girls safe.

While installing any app, on the Smartphone, do check its reviews on Google. Check out what permissions you give to the installed apps. You can withdraw the permissions back from the settings even later. If you want to prevent data leakage from your Smartphone, you can use apps like Via Protect or OS Monitor. Keep the original and essential apps on your Smartphone. Be careful and alert.

       

       ©Kavita Datar