Google is raising the bar for Android. Its latest upgrade is timely and now coming to more than a billion phones. It’s hard to overstate how critical this is.
“Phone theft is more than just losing a device,” Google says. In reality, having your device stolen “can leave you suddenly vulnerable to personal data and financial theft.” The solution — or at least part of the solution — is the Android-maker’s newly revamped “multi-layered defenses” to help protect users “before, during and after a theft.”
This is the new normal. An acceptance that millions of phones will be stolen, turning the focus to damage control rather than theft prevention. Yes, it’s important to make it difficult for thieves to use, sell or recycle devices. But it’s more critical to prevent them accessing your security credentials or your sensitive data, or using your credit cards.
Google’s latest iteration of its Theft Protection for Android 16 will better safeguard any app or data protected by biometrics. If your phone is not in one of your “trusted places,” a PIN can’t be used to override your facial ID or fingerprint.
And when it comes to PINs, Google is now “making it harder for a thief to guess your PIN, pattern, or password by increasing the lockout time after failed attempts. To ensure you aren’t locked out by mistake (by a curious child, for instance), identical incorrect guesses no longer count toward your retry limit.”
Even more critically, Google is enhancing the Remote Lock feature that lets you secure a stolen device “from any web browser” after it’s taken. “We are adding a new optional security question/challenge to the process. This helps ensure that only you, the real device owner, can initiate a lock, adding another layer of security to your recovery flow.”
And an additional innovation that’s now “default-on in Brazil” gives a strong signal as to what’s likely to come to users more widely. A Theft Detection Lock “uses on-device AI to sense motion and context that may indicate a ‘snatch-and-run’ theft. If a theft attempt is detected, it will quickly lock the device screen to help protect your data.”
There’s a strong chance you’ll suffer a phone theft at some point — it’s simply too common these days to assume otherwise. Whether it’s an Android or an iPhone device in your pocket or purse, familiarize yourself with the latest theft protections. Enable these and ensure you lock down your data as best you can.
Don’t leave this until it’s too late.
