According to a new study by Cambridge University, Android’s factory reset option doesn’t really erase all your personal data. In the study titled ‘Security Analysis of Android Factory Resets’, the researches tested 21 Android smartphones made by 5 different manufacturers. The devices tested run on Android 2.3 to Android 4.3.
Sad to say, all devices tested actually retained a part of the ex-user’s private data including e-mails, SMS, pictures, videos, as well as personal contact information from third party apps which include Facebook and Whatsapp.
According to the researches, the most worrisome issue however, is the fact that this data are still accessible even though full-disk encryption was used. Similarly, researches also claimed that they’re able to obtain the master token to access the user’s Google data easily.
So here comes the question – should we sell our devices?
