Your iPhone is an extension of you and your life… As such iPhone security techniques are important to know how to secure your iPhone from hackers. You also don’t want to misplace your iPhone or let a thief get away with it, if you can help it.
This article and the accompanying video describe three steps you can take, including two tools you can purchase that are worth the investment, to strengthen your iPhone security and reduce the chances of losing your phone.
1) Phone Buddy For Apple Watch
Before you secure your iPhone from hackers, be sure it is secure in your physical environment. This means making sure you know where your iPhone is at all times and that it is never far away from you if you’re in a strange place.
If you have both an iPhone and Apple Watch, Phone Buddy Notifier is an inexpensive, top five Apple Watch app that strengthens iPhone security by alerting you if you lose the bluetooth connection with your iPhone.
Whether you’re at the office, our at a coffee shop or a bar at night, or traveling to a conference far away from home, using Phone Buddy adds a local layer of physical security by notifying you on your Apple Watch when your iPhone is moving away from you.
Phone Buddy is only $4.99 as of this post, and is worth every penny.
You can configure it so an alarm goes off when your iPhone is more than a predetermined distance from you. Phone Buddy creates a “Lost Alert” which will launch a haptic vibration and alert sound on your Apple Watch whenever your iPhone is moving away from you.
If it’s a false alarm, you can mute the alarm right on your Apple Watch, if you don’t need it.
Phone Buddy app provides a lot of control over configuration. For instance, if you don’t want to be notified at home, the app can be adjusted to recognize certain WiFi networks, and only work away from home or other unfamiliar settings.
If you lose your iPhone in a familiar setting, like your home or office, you can tap your Apple Watch to play a loud alert sound that will help you find your iPhone.
The app also works in reverse, and if you want you can enable “Lost Watch” alerts as well. If you take off your Apple Watch and misplace it you can use the iPhone to alert you when the Apple Watch is moving apart from you or you can play a sound on the Apple Watch to help you locate your Apple Watch.
Phone Buddy app requires WatchOS 6 or later and works with almost any Apple Watch, or Apple Watch Ultra.
If you have an Apple Watch and iPhone, this is a must have app for iPhone security.
2) Increase iPhone Security And Prevent SIM Swapping With Efani
SIM swapping is a true nightmare situation.
Imagine a criminal, posing as you, instructs your cellphone company to port your iPhone phone number to a different SIM card that they control…
This is very common hack and is called a “SIM swap”.
Hackers can accomplish this because mobile phone carriers often lack strong two factor authentication (2FA) or multi-factor authentication (MFA) methods to offer their customers, such as an authenticator app or a physical hardware key, such as a YubiKey Bio, or virtual Passkey.
What Is A SIM Card?
The SIM on your phone, which stands for “subscriber identity module”, is virtual within a small chip or a physical card that identifies and authenticates you as a subscriber on your mobile network.
Whether you use AT&T, T-Mobile, Verizon, Efani, Consumer Cellular, etc.. your SIM card includes personal identification data such as your phone number, carrier details, and your security credentials.
A SIM swap is an account takeover where a criminal convinces a representative at your mobile carrier into transferring your mobile number to a SIM card that they control.
Unfortunately, SIM swap crime is rampant because the success rate is so high.1 A Stanford University study found that all major wireless carriers were vulnerable to SIM swapping attacks on their customers.
To successfully SIM swap you, a cybercriminal may just search for public data on you and pretend to be you, or they may pay money to bribe customer service representatives (CSRs) who are often unappreciated for the responsibilities they have, or are paid low wages, or both, while they’re entrusted to protect your personal data and the security of your mobile phone number.
Cybercriminals use your SIM card along with emails and other personal data to impersonate you to gain access to critical accounts, such as cryptocurrency accounts, or your mobile phone service. When a criminal is successful and a SIM swap is complete, all calls, texts, and verification codes – including 2FA codes – go to the attacker’s phone.
Cell phone companies are historically horrendous at protecting your mobile phone number… If you feel your carrier is not serious enough about protecting your account, you can move to Efani, a wireless carrier that focuses on security of your account.
Efani puts your security-first, uses multiple layers of authentication, such as video calls and out of band communications, to help prevent account takeovers. They also offer you the ability to add a physical passkey and/or a mobile authenticator app as a 2FA/MFA method to access your online account.
3) Enable iPhone Stolen Device Protection
There are many steps you can take to strengthen iPhone security. These steps include:
- Adding privacy glass to protect your screen
- Using a VPN or iCloud Private Relay
- Turning on Advanced Data Protection
- Maintaining strong passwords
Additionally, enabling Stolen Device Protection adds a layer of security when your iPhone is away from familiar locations, such as home or work.
Enabling Stolen Device Protection helps protect your accounts and personal information in case your iPhone is ever lost or stolen.
With Stolen Device Protection, some features and actions have additional security requirements. These requirements help prevent someone who has stolen your iPhone and knows your passcode from making critical changes to your account or device.
- Face ID or Touch ID biometric authentication: Some actions such as accessing stored passwords and credit cards require a biometric authentication with Face ID or Touch ID — with no passcode alternative or fallback — so that only you can access these features.
- Security Delay: Some security actions such as changing your Apple Account password also require you to wait an hour and then perform an additional Face ID or Touch ID authentication.
In the event that your iPhone is stolen, the security delay is designed to prevent a thief from performing critical operations so that you can use iCloud to mark your device as lost and make sure your Apple account is secure.
Just like with Phone Buddy above, when your iPhone is in a “familiar location”, these additional steps can be configured so they are not required, and you can use your iPhone passcode like usual.
Familiar locations typically include your home, work, and certain other locations where you regularly use your phone… However, if you want, you can set up Stolen Device Protection to always require these additional security measures, even when your iPhone is in a familiar location.
Stolen Device Protection is available with iOS 17.3 or later and must be turned on before the device is lost or stolen.
How to turn Stolen Device Protection on or off
To turn on Stolen Device Protection, you must use two-factor authentication for your Apple Account and set up or enable the following on your iPhone: a device passcode; Face ID or Touch ID.
You need to have location services and Find My turned on, and you can’t turn it off while Stolen Device Protection is enabled.
You can turn on Stolen Device Protection in Settings:
- Go to Settings, then tap Face ID & Passcode.
- Enter your device passcode.
- Tap Stolen Device Protection, then turn Stolen Device Protection on or off.
Biometric Authentication:
With Stolen Device Protection, if your iPhone is not in a familiar location, you must authenticate with biometric authentication, such as Face ID or Touch ID, before you can take certain actions, including the following:
- Use passwords or passkeys saved in Keychain
- Use payment methods saved in Safari (AutoFill)
- Turn off Lost Mode
- Open a locked app
- Erase all content and settings
- Apply for a new Apple Card
- View your Apple Card or Apple Cash virtual card number
- Take certain Apple Cash and Savings actions in Wallet (for example, Apple Cash or Savings transfers)
- Use your iPhone to set up a new device (for example, Quick Start)
- Set up or transfer an eSIM
You can still use your iPhone passcode for purchases with Apple Pay.
Security Delay:
With Stolen Device Protection, you may also be required to wait an hour before using your iPhone to make changes to critical security settings or your Apple Account.
If your iPhone is not in a familiar location, you must authenticate with Face ID or Touch ID, wait for the security delay to end, then authenticate with Face ID or Touch ID again to update settings such as the following:
- Change your Apple Account password
- Sign out of your Apple Account
- Update Apple Account security settings (such as adding or removing a trusted device, Recovery Key, or Recovery Contact)
- Add or remove Face ID or Touch ID
- Change your passcode
- Reset All Settings
- Enroll in Mobile Device Management
- Turn off Stolen Device Protection
If you use your iPhone to change your Apple Account password, the location of your devices may not be visible at iCloud.com for a period of time.
Your iPhone may end the security delay early after it detects that you’ve arrived at a familiar location.
iPhone Security Summary
Your iPhone is synonymous with you and contains a vault of personal data, such as photos, health information, passwords, credit cards and other financial details.
How much would you pay to get it back if your iPhone was lost or stolen?
While Apple’s ecosystem is generally secure, artificial intelligence has made it easier than ever for hackers to impersonate you or companies you do business with.
If you are paranoid about losing your iPhone or having it hacked, using for all your accounts, I would consider the steps above for anyone who is looking for ways to increase your iPhone security and secure your iPhone from hackers.
To reduce your risk of losing control of your phone, you can create multiple layers of defense that make your iPhone exponentially harder to compromise.
In an era of rising digital threats, proactive security isn’t optional, it’s essential.
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Footnotes
- A recent hack of Coinbase was an inside job by a customer service representative who was selling customer data to hackers who impersonated Coinbase representatives in order to gain access to and take over their accounts.
