How to permanently delete nudes from your phone

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Follow these steps to permanently delete nudes from your phone, whether it is an iPhone or Android, and anything else that might be left behind for a new owner.

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We aren’t asking why you did it, who you sent them to or how long ago they were taken. You want to delete nudes from your phone — permanently. We are here to help.

Maybe you are selling your old phone or giving it to a friend or family member. But, simply hitting the delete button isn’t enough in today’s age of data.

Metadata, to be exact, knows a lot about your photos and in turn you. It knows where you took the photo, which type of camera, when it was taken and a lot more about the type of file and any edits that were made.

If you want to remove nude photos from your phone, Apple or Android, follow these steps.

How to erase nudes, and everything else, from your iPhone

1. Unpair your Apple Watch

If you have an Apple Watch, be aware that the device is very good at maintaining an automated backup of your data. The first step in permanently deleting everything from your iPhone is unpairing the watch. 

First, open the Apple Watch app, click the “My Watch” tab and under the “i” button, click unpaid Apple Watch.

2. Backup everything

If you do want to maintain some of the data from your old phone such as contacts, old photos and notes, it’s best to do so via an iCloud account. 

To create a backup:

1. Click settings
2. Select Apple ID
3. Select iCloud
4. Select iCloud Backup
5. Select Backup Now

3. Sign out 

Now that you have made a backup of everything you want to keep, sign out of your Apple ID. To do so click on Settings, navigate to Apple ID and select Sign Out.

4. Delete your messages 

At this point you should go ahead and delete all the messages off your phone.

This is a simple procedure. Go to Settings, select Messages and slid “iMesasge” to off.

5. It’s time to delete those photos

Apple is not kind to its users. There is no capability to delete all of your photos with one clean click of the button. To do so you must delete the photos one-by-one… 

6. Delete the apps you aren’t using

Go ahead and delete the apps as well, especially iMessage.

7. The Big Reset

Now that you have done your due diligence in cleaning up your past, it’s time to hit the reset.

To restore the phone to its factory settings:

1. Click settings
2. Select general
3. Select Reset
4. Select “Erase All Content and Settings”

8. Sell your phone

At this point you can be sure your nudes and everything else along with them are gone forever. You can be confident is selling that phone of yours with peace of mind.

How to erase nudes from your Android phone

1. Back it up

Step one in erasing everything from your phone is backing up what you do want to keep. 

Select Setting on your Android device, followed by System and finally Backup.

2. Allow for factory reset

Next, you need to deactivate the setting that was put in place to make it difficult for thieves to easily reset Android devices.

To turn off “Factory Reset Protection,” select Settings, then Security or Screen Security followed by switching Screen Lock to off.

3. Sign out of your Google account

To make sure your data isn’t deleted from your backup too, logout of your Google account at this step.

To do so: Select Settings followed by Accounts,  click on Google account and finally click Remove Accounts

4. Turn on encryption

Unlike with Apple, a full reset does not entirely delete all of your data. At this step you should encrypt your device to ensure the new owner can’t access anything.

To encrypt your device:

1. Select Settings
2. Select Security 
3. Select Advanced
4. Select Encryption & access data
5. Turn Encryption on

5. Reset

It’s time to erase any final traces of your past life from your Andoid.

To reset your phone:

1. Select Settings
2. Select System
3. Select Advanced
4. Select Reset Options
5. Select Erase all data

6. Delete your phone from your list of devices

If you want to ensure every trace of your phone’s existence is gone, go to your Google device management page on your new phone or device, find your old device and logout of it.

Take it a step further

Now that you are here and taking a step toward digital privacy, let’s look at a few additional ways you can clean up your privacy.

A good first step is to check if you have been a part of a data breach.

If you want to go a step further, begin the process of deleting your social media accounts.

Finally, let us show you how to delete yourself from internet search engines.