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The Protesters' Guide to Smartphone Security (Promoted to an OP)
https://www.privacyguides.org/articles/2025/01/23/activists-guide-securing-your-smartphone/Privacy Guides content is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International Public License, and the underlying source code used to format and display that content on www.privacyguides.org is licensed under the MIT License.
Rationale below.
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For most protesters, activists, and journalists, your smartphone is an essential tool you depend on for organizing with your peers, accessing and distributing information, and helping others. It also represents a great risk, as a tool that is easily appropriated by authorities for targeted and mass surveillance.
The perennial question when it comes to protests is whether you should bring your phone at all. If you leave your phone at home, that is probably the safest your data will get, and you will be at very low risk of being tracked by mass surveillance tools. On the other hand, your phone is a critical resource when it comes to coordinating with others, getting updates on the protest from social media, or simply documenting what is going on with your phone's camera.
If possible, bringing a separate device like a "burner phone," an old phone you can reset, or even a regular old-fashioned camera is a much better option than bringing your primary phone. Any data you don't bring with you can't be taken from you at the scene.
However, getting access to or affording devices like these aren't a realistic option for many people. Whether you decide to take your smartphone or a secondary smartphone with you to the event, this guide will cover how to maximize that device's security and minimize risks to your privacy.
Update (2025-01-27): This article has been updated based on some community feedback, notably I added the Burner Phones, Minimize Your Stored Data, Use Public Wi-Fi, and Check Your Keyboard sections.
Your Risks at a Protest
There are plenty of risks you should consider if you use your smartphone at a protest. We are going to try and cover the following in this guide:
1. Losing your device.
2. Authorities confiscating your smartphone.
3. Service disruption, either due to intentional interference by authorities or caused by networks being overloaded by large groups of people.
4. Targeted surveillance:
5. Mass surveillance:
Like all of our guides, we are going to cover the general best practices and provide helpful tips, but your individual situation may be different. You should always research and plan according to what you specifically are doing, and if you need legal advice you should always consult a qualified and licensed attorney.
The perennial question when it comes to protests is whether you should bring your phone at all. If you leave your phone at home, that is probably the safest your data will get, and you will be at very low risk of being tracked by mass surveillance tools. On the other hand, your phone is a critical resource when it comes to coordinating with others, getting updates on the protest from social media, or simply documenting what is going on with your phone's camera.
If possible, bringing a separate device like a "burner phone," an old phone you can reset, or even a regular old-fashioned camera is a much better option than bringing your primary phone. Any data you don't bring with you can't be taken from you at the scene.
However, getting access to or affording devices like these aren't a realistic option for many people. Whether you decide to take your smartphone or a secondary smartphone with you to the event, this guide will cover how to maximize that device's security and minimize risks to your privacy.
Update (2025-01-27): This article has been updated based on some community feedback, notably I added the Burner Phones, Minimize Your Stored Data, Use Public Wi-Fi, and Check Your Keyboard sections.
Your Risks at a Protest
There are plenty of risks you should consider if you use your smartphone at a protest. We are going to try and cover the following in this guide:
1. Losing your device.
2. Authorities confiscating your smartphone.
3. Service disruption, either due to intentional interference by authorities or caused by networks being overloaded by large groups of people.
4. Targeted surveillance:
Disrupting your service.
Blocking delivery of calls/SMS to your number.
Monitoring your unencrypted traffic.
Monitoring communications over local radios like walkie-talkies, etc.
5. Mass surveillance:
Interference with web services. Popular communication platforms like Twitter or TikTok could be throttled or blocked.
Interference with messengers and voice services like Signal or WhatsApp.
Authorities could use public Wi-Fi networks in the area to monitor traffic and identify nearby devices.
Cell phone companies could provide records to authorities of devices near cell towers in the area to track and identify protesters.
Like all of our guides, we are going to cover the general best practices and provide helpful tips, but your individual situation may be different. You should always research and plan according to what you specifically are doing, and if you need legal advice you should always consult a qualified and licensed attorney.
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